GANGNEUNG, Korea (World Curling Federation)– 12 teams will compete for the Mount Titlis World Women’s Curling Championship 2009 as play begins on Saturday at the Gangneung International Indoor Ice Rink.
The Mount Titlis Worlds, which run March 21-29, will feature all three podium teams from last year’s Ford World Women’s Championship in Vernon, Canada.
Critical qualification points are also on the line as countries attempt to qualify for the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games. The Mount Titlis Worlds represent the final qualifying opportunity for Vancouver 2010.
This is the first World Women’s Curling Championship to be hosted in Korea, but the second for an Asian country within the last three years. The 2007 World Women’s Curling Championship was hosted in Aomori, Japan.
“The World Curling Federation welcomes the best women’s high-performance curling teams to Korea and Gangneung City,” said Les Harrison, president of the WCF.
“The importance of the growing Asian market, reflected both on the ice in competition and through the increase in both television and participation interest, is recognized at the highest levels of our organization.”
An all-star field of previous world and Olympic champions has assembled for the Championship. Defending world champions Canada will once again be lead by Jennifer Jones. Canada has won a leading 15 world women’s titles since 1979.
Last year’s silver medalists, China, also return with skip Bingyu Wang, who won the gold medal at the recent 24th Winter Universiade (Winter University Games) held in Harbin, China.
Switzerland will be represented by Mirjam Ott, the skip last year’s bronze medal-winning foursome and the current Le Gruyere European Champions. Ott herself is the only curler in the world with two Olympic medals, having won silver at both Salt Lake City in 2002 and Turin in 2006.
Returning after a one-year absence are the reigning Olympic champion and two-time world champions from Sweden, skipped by Anette Norberg. Sweden has won seven world women’s titles, behind only Canada.
Denmark’s 2007 world silver medallists have also returned, skipped by Angelina Jensen.
Leading Scotland into Gangneung will be 18-year-old Eve Muirhead, who just captured her record-setting third consecutive World Junior Championship at the Vancouver Olympic Centre last Sunday. All eyes will be on the curling prodigy as she will combine with a newly-formed team to attempt a return to the podium.
Also competing are hosts Korea (skip Mi-Yeon Kim), Russia’s 2006 Le Gruyere European champions (skip Liudmila Privivkova), Germany’s veteran Andrea Schoepp, who is making her 16th world women’s championship appearance, Norway’s European B-pool qualifiers (skip Marianne Roervik), Italy’s 2006 European finalists (skip Diana Gaspari) and 2003 world champion and recent 2010 Olympic qualifier Debbie McCormick of the United States.
CurlTV is providing extensive web coverage, while TSN is telecasting the semi-final on March 28, and the final on the 29th. Live scoring and real-time results will be available from the event website, wwcc2009.com