Beating Team Edin at the weekend should have been a huge boost to Tom Brewster and his rink because the Swedes had to be the red hot favourites going into the European Championships.
Niklas Edin… the pocket rocket from Sweden. I know him well both on the ice and off the ice, a great guy who loves to curl.
We have the same record in having won two world championships and three Europeans and I see a lot of similarities in our attitude to curling. We live and breath it.
Spending so much time on tour you make a lot of good friends. Every week on tour will be similar teams moving from city to city or country to country so you see the same guys all season essentially.
Nik gets it. He know you need to be full time to be the best. That’s why his team has spent a huge amount of time in Canada these last few years.
Last season they rented a house in Ottawa and stayed for three months playing nearly every weekend. Some say it was too much, they got burnout, but for me it was their way of learning and it was part of their long term plan.
Having the vision to develop, get lots of experience in for his young team and take them forward. It may not have paid off last year but boy has it paid off this year. Back to back Grand Slam titles to start this season.
Not only had a European team never won a Grand Slam of Curling event before but they do it twice in a three week period against the top 15 teams in the world. An incredible feat.
Team Sweden bring a heavy hitting power with Canadian offense strategy. They are always exciting to watch and also to play against. Bring your ‘A’ game if you want to win.
I've had some incredible battles with Niklas over the years and he has also been my teammate. At the Continental Cup I asked Niklas to play on our team when Team North America took on Team Europe. I was short of a player due to work commitments so I brought him into our team for the week. I knew then that he would go on to do big things in the game. Maybe I shouldn't have encouraged him!
Our most recent battles have been tight affairs. We can be evenly matched when we are at our best.
We have also broken each other's sporting dreams. In 2010 at the Vancouver Olympics we were the reigning world champions and had been touted as potential gold medallists. Team Sweden KO’d us in a play-off and shattered our team’s dream.
Roll on 2014. We beat Norway in the play-off game before taking on Niklas' Team Sweden in the semi-final who had been very consistent during Games. It was my turn to inflict the grief. A last end win to put us in the Olympic final and send them to the bronze medal game (which they duly won).
Sport is glorious but it can also be cruel. Friendships are common among rivals in sport but on the field of play the friendship ends and battles commence. It doesn't matter who you play against, winning is all that matters, especially when you have a dream goal.
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