TOM Brewster achieved a lifetime's ambition when he walked into the Olympic Stadium last night, but he admits his main challenge in Sochi now is to ensure he keeps the smile on his face.
He has been named as the alternate for the Great Britain men's curling team, a watching brief best described as being invited to the party but not allowed to dance.
Alongside Scott Andrews, Greg Drummond and Michael Goodfellow, Brewster skipped Scotland to world championship silver medals in 2011 and 2012 and seemed to be on course to achieve his Olympic dream at the fifth time of asking.
David Murdoch, the two-time world champion, added muscle to the rink last season but they still played, and even Tweeted, as Team Brewster, even when the three-time Olympian assumed skipping duties.
However, five into four clearly doesn't go and the rotation policy stopped this season with Brewster apparently happy to support Murdoch as third, an arrangement which won the team bronze at the recent European Championships.
He is now out of the picture and watching from the stands and his face in Sochi yesterday, momentarily at least, didn't hide his obvious disappointment. "I'm the unlucky one," he said. "Any of the five of us could be sitting where I am.
"We chose to bring David on to bring some experience and get us in the position to be here. We've realised that taking to the ice with the same four players is beneficial as opposed to chopping and changing between five guys which we did last season - that just didn't work for us. But let's be frank, these guys wouldn't be here unless I was part of the team. I've been on the long journey with this rink just to reach this point. I'm disappointed but it's important I don't mope. I have to be positive for the other guys. We're a team, we're very close and if you are dragging down the mood it will effect the whole squad."
Brewster admits it will be hard to watch if Murdoch - at the third time of asking - finally delivers on his podium potential. British men's rinks have arrived at the last five Games considered serious medal contenders but a fourth place in Turin eight years ago remains the best return.
"We've won three world medals in the last three years and that says all you need to know about this team. The truth is we should be medalling here," added Brewster, 39, who skipped Scotland to the world junior title in 1995 with Murdoch as his alternate.
"If we won a medal it would be a bittersweet feeling but I'm not done yet. If you look back at previous Olympic Games, people in their late forties have won gold and this just makes me want it more. It took me four finals and more than 10 years before I won my first Scottish title and it's the same feeling I have now.
"Injury, illness or bad form could happen at any time. I'll be on ice every day practicing and I'm fit and ready to play, if I'm needed but I can't do anymore than I've done."
n Samsung are a partner of Team GB and are supporting the Samsung Galaxy Team. To meet the team, see exclusive content and win amazing prizes, including once-in-a-lifetime winter sport training sessions with Samsung Galaxy Team athletes, www.samsung.com/uk/sochi2014
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article