World number one skip Bruce Mouat and Olympic gold medallist Jen Dodds will represent Scotland in both team and mixed doubles events at this year’s World Championships.
For Mouat in particular, regaining one or both titles – having won the mixed doubles with Dodds in 2021 before leading his team to victory at the men’s World Championships in 2023 – would cap an extraordinary season. 
Ahead of this season’s BKT Tires World Men’s Championships which takes place in Moose Jaw, Canada from 29 March – 6 April, Mouat, Grant Hardie, Bobby Lammie and Hammy McMillan have claimed a total of five tournament wins on the men’s circuit, including three of Canada’s highly prized Grand Slam of Curling events, as well as a fifth appearance in the final at the European Curling Championships.
That has given a team that already has a full set of World Championship medals, a dominant lead in the world rankings, taking them further clear of the second placed team than the second placed team is ahead of 10th.
In between those successes he and Dodds have meanwhile managed to claim two more mixed doubles titles on tour also reaching the final of the only other international event they have contested, taking them to fourth in the world rankings as they prepare for the World Mixed Doubles Curling Championships in Fredericton, Canada from 26 April – 3 May.
“We really want to top off what has been one of our best seasons as a team with a World Championships,” Mouat said of the men’s event, as he prepares for yet another trip across the Atlantic.
“To get the opportunity to do that in Canada again is pretty special and that is exactly what we are aiming for.”
While his team suffered a rare disappointment at this month’s national championships where they topped the round-robin rankings before losing out in the final to world number four ranked Team Whyte, Mouat believes that is merely an indicator of the quality of the environment being created within the Scottish game that is benefiting all concerned.
“We feel like our form is really good, we have played really well and our performance at the Scottish we were proud of ourselves,” he said.
“We were obviously gutted not to win the Scottish but our stats were good and we just had a couple of bad ends and now having the domestic competition that we do in Scotland, it is pretty tough to win these events. 
“If you do have a few bad ends or games your opposition will punish you and it is amazing to see the standard that the Scottish Champs is bringing.
“You have to be on your A game to win these events and when you are on you’re A minus game you don’t necessarily win it.”
After one more competition at The Players Championship, where Teams Mouat and Whyte will be seeking to complete an unprecedented clean sweep of wins by Scottish teams in a single season of Grand Slam events, his attention will then switch to the other Olympic discipline.
“Jen and I have put a lot of work in over the last six to eight months trying to get ourselves back to a World Championships and having the three events to play in – two in Switzerland and one in Sweden - over the season we have played really well and to get the opportunity to wear the Scotland kit again is very special.
“It is very exciting to have the two opportunities to go to the World Championships and I never take the opportunities lightly and I always work very hard to get those, so it should be a very exciting end to what has been an incredible season.”
Dodds echoed those sentiments as she looked forward to doubling up.
”It is always a privilege to represent Scotland at two World Championships and I never take that for granted as it is always such an honour to have Scotland on your back,” she said.
“I feel it is a great opportunity in both the team and mixed doubles event to show how we can perform and I think we have demonstrated that in both disciplines this year.
“It is a tricky time co-ordinating things around our championships fitting in the mixed doubles training around both men’s and women’s Worlds and the Slam but we have had a good chunk of training before I head off to South Korea and it is a balancing act. 
“We have had time to work on a few things to build on our last performance in Gothenburg and when we meet up again after the team events we should feel like we are in a good place.
“We have good plans In place but overall it is an exciting time and this is where you want to be at this time of year and obviously the whole season is geared up for peaking, at the Euros in November and this is the next peak time so we are ready for this and just looking forward to getting going.”
All three events represent the final opportunities to gain the points required to earn automatic qualification at next year’s Winter Olympics in Milan-Cortina where Team GB’s women will be aiming to defend the title they won in Beijing in 2022.
Dodds was among those gold medallists, but now has three new team mates in Sophie Jackson, Sophie Sinclair and Rebecca Morrison, who plays skip stones and is relishing the prospect of a new experience at these LGT World Women’s Championships.
“It will be the third world championships that we have played in together and it will be different for us to be going to Korea,” said Morrison.
“It is somewhere I have never been before – although the rest of the team have, so it is just something a little bit different which is exciting as it adds just a bit more variety to our season and it is a cool way to end that race chasing qualifying points for Team GB.”
As they do so, they will look to draw on their most recent performance at a major international championships where they put in a fine performance to finish on the podium at the European Curling Championships at the end of last year. 
“Our experience in November at the Europeans gives us a lot of confidence and we were performing at such a high level when we won that bronze medal, so we just want to get back to that fantastic performance we had out there,” said Morrison.
“We know it is in us we have done it many times before so know we need to bank a few weeks of training at home before getting out there in Korea.”
They, too, lost out in the final at the recent national championships, but as the topped ranked Scottish team in the women’s world rankings, they again see the quality of the domestic competition as only being beneficial.
“The Scottish Championships was a valuable experience and it had that major championships feel so that will be useful to us heading into next month,” Morrison observed.
In a late line-up change for Team Scotland at the forthcoming World Wheelchair Champs, Keith Gray will make his debut as he replaces Gregor Ewan, coming in as the alternate for the team event.
World Curling Championships:
LGT World Women’s Curling Championships, Uijeongbu, Korea – 15-23 March 2025
BKT Tires World Men’s Curling Championships, Moose Jaw, Canada – 29 March – 6 April 2025
World Mixed Doubles Curling Championships, Fredericton, Canada – 26 April – 3 May 2025
Team Scotland Men
Bruce Mouat
Grant Hardie
Bobby Lammie
Hammy McMillan
Kyle Waddell (alternate)
Head Coach Greg Drummond
Team Coach Michael Goodfellow
Team Scotland Women
Rebecca Morrison
Jen Dodds
Sophie Sinclair
Sophie Jackson (skip)
Fay Henderson (alternate)
Head Coach Greg Drummond
Team Coach Ross Paterson
Team Scotland Mixed Doubles
Jen Dodds
Bruce Mouat
Head Coach Greg Drummond
Team Coach Ross Paterson
Images: PPA/Graeme Hart, Team GB/David Pearce and Anil Mungal/GSOC.
