Scotland’s leading Winter Olympic contenders appeared to set the tone for the week yesterday with results falling very much in line with expectations as the men’s event at the Scottish Curling Championships got underway.

There were wins for defending champions Team Brewster, Olympic silver medallists Team Murdoch and Team Smith, the first Scottish men to reach a Grand Slam final in Canada earlier this season.

However first off the ice, completing their win with three ends to spare, were reigning World Junior champions Team Mouat who enjoyed a morale boosting success earlier this month at the World University Games (WUGs).

“Winning the WUGs was fantastic,” said skip Bruce Mouat.

“We gained a lot from playing in a major championships and we’re one of the few teams in the tournament this week that have done that this year. It’s good experience coming into this week and we want to continue that good form from WUGs and hopefully get to the play-offs this week. From there anything can happen.”

By definition the 22-year-old had to be in full-time education to take part in that competition, but having also won the Scottish Mixed Doubles title with Gina Aitken this season, earning them a place at the World Mixed Doubles championship and putting them in pole position for Winter Olympic selection in that event if they can earn Britain one of the eight qualifying spots, he admitted that his studies have been taking a back seat.

“It’s been an amazing month and it was great being able to concentrate only on curling,” he said.

“You can see the improvements in our game having more time on ice and less time at University.”

It was certainly an assured first performance as they forced Chay Telfer into taking a single at the opening end of their match, levelling at the next before stealing a total of six shots in the course of the next four ends on the way to a 7-2 victory in seven ends.

“We went out firing on all cylinders and put the other team under pressure. They had a few misses and that’s where our steals came from,” he said.

They were quickly followed into the dressing rooms by the defending champions, whose skip Tom Brewster, has had to shrug off a heavy cold in the build-up to the event.

“I’m not 100 per cent, but I’m feeling way better. Physically I wasn’t good during the week but now it’s just my head and that just saves me thinking about the wrong sort of things during the match,” he joked, following their 803 win over Team Hamilton.

In more serious vein he was satisfied with the way they had imposed themselves, claiming threes the first two times they held the hammer, to be in a position to control the match.

“We were in control as soon as we got the first three. We should have lost a two straight back because gave them an opportunity when I think my last stone might have picked up, but they didn’t get it and whenever we had the hammer we scored and we scored big, so that was nice to see.”

Brewster’s Sochi Olympic team-mates had to work harder for their win before skip Dave Murdoch’s take out with the final shot of the final end sealed a 4-2 victory over Team Taylor, but he was satisfied with the way they had started.

“Every team here this week will give challenges in different ways. Today’s opponents were a bit of an unknown quantity, but you’ve just to deal with that,” the three time Olympian observed.

Perhaps the most controlled performance of all came from Kyle Smith’s rink as they claimed a three at the opening end against Team Fraser and did not concede a shot until the seventh end, before wrapping things up 6-1 with a two at the eighth while the other winners on the opening day of the 10 team contest were Team Hardie, who performed well at this venue last month when reaching the quarter-finals of the prestigious Perth Masters and ran out 7-3 winners against Team Whyte, the beaten finalists at last month’s Scottish Junior Championships.