VIERUMAKI, FINLAND – Canada's duo of Dean Ross and Susan O'Connor recovered from a bout of stomach flu to outlast Slovakia 12-11 at the first World Mixed Doubles Curling Championship.

Canada lost their first game of the competition 10-6 to Italy on Monday evening, with Ross suffering from a flu bug that has swept through the teams. It has also affected athletes at the neighboring World Seniors Championships.

Ross shrugged off his ailment and teamed with O'Connor for a wild match against Slovakia's Stefan Turna and Barbora Vojtusova. The Canadians broke open a 3-2 match by scoring four in the third end for a 7-2 lead, but the Slovaks roared right back with four of thir own in the fifth.

Canada added four more points over the next two ends, but ran into taekout trouble in the seventh end, where Slovakia scored five to tie the game. In the eighth and final frame, O'Connor missed a peel but the Slovaks couldn't capitalize, and Ross confirmed the winning point without having to throw his last rock.

O'Connor was shaking her head over the five-ender after the match.

"That's very easy to do when you take out your own stones. Twice," said O'Connor.

"From a curler's point of view, it's totally frustrating to give them a free draw for five," said Ross. "But there's going to be five rocks in play by the time you can hit anything for the first time. You've just got to let it go and prepare for the next end, but that's hard too. She's at the other end and I don't have any teammates to pump me up.

"It's an exciting format, and from a fan's view, it's great. The ends go by quickly and there's lots to watch."

Ross is such a fan of the new curling discipline that he dismissed one aspect of the Brier, the famous Canadian curling championship, in comparison.

"When we're not playing I've been coming to watch, and in one respect I enjoy watching this more than the Brier," said Ross.

"I've been to a lot of Briers and it's easy to watch four sheets at once there, but it's really hard to watch four sheets of ice here. There's so much going on."

Mixed Doubles features two teammates delivering five stones alternating with their opponents. The player throwing first also throws last, with the teammate delivering stones two, three, and four. Athletes must sweep their own stones and there are two additional stones placed into play at the start of each end.

Canada had previously defeated England 11-3, Estonia 10-3 and Sweden by a 7-5 count to start the week. At 4-1 and with final round-robin matches scheduled for Wednesday against Hungary and Japan, they lead their pool with five teams just a game behind.

Many observers are describing Switzerland as the team to beat. Toni Mueller, who skipped the Swiss men into the playoffs at December's Le Gruyère European Championships, has teamed with Zurich women's skip Irene Schori to build an impressive 5-0 record in their pool.

"I think they know how to throw on this ice," said Canadian coach Paul Webster. "They're not jumping up to sweep as much as others, and they're still getting those hits and rolls. That's tough to do with no sweeping, and they're obviously tuned in to the ice really well."

Following Switzerland are Finland and China at 4-1, with New Zealand at 3-2. The United States pairing of Nate and Jamie Haskell was forced to miss their fourth-round match due to the flu bug, and returned to the ice Tuesday. They lost 8-7 to China to fall to 2-3 and were scheduled to battle the Swiss Tuesday night. 

In other Tuesday fifth-round action, Norway's Tormod Andreasson and Linn Githmark thumped France's Lionel Rioux and Helene Grieshaber 8-2 to lead their pool at 4-1, while the Czech Republic edged Latvia 6-5, Russia beat back a late surge from Australia to win 7-6 and Scotland came back to defeat Spain 8-5.

The Finnish Curling Association is posting live results online of both Championships. The World Mixed Doubles results will be available at: curling.fi/en/competitions/leagues/2688 and the World Seniors can be viewed at: curling.fi/en/competitions/leagues/2687

In addition, results are mirrored on the World Curling Federation website at: results.worldcurling.org

The host websites for the Championships are: wmdcc2008.com (World Mixed Doubles) and: www.wscc2008.com (World Seniors).

OSTERSUND – The United States captured only its third global junior men's title – and first since 1984 – with a 7-5 victory over hosts Sweden on the final day of the 2008 World Junior Curling Championship.

Skip Chris Plys, competing in his third consecutive World Juniors, stole a huge deuce to open the match against Sweden's Oskar Eriksson before snapping a three-ender in the third end for a 5-2 lead. The Americans then blanked two ends and held Sweden to a single in the sixth.

In the seventh, Plys missed a short runback to score a bunch and Sweden stole one to close the gap to 5-4. But a U.S. deuce in the eighth put the score to 7-4 and the countdown was on.

"This is the best feeling ever, I can't really describe it," said Plys.

"Many good teams don't get a chance to come here."

The Americans were the third team to finish atop the standings at 7-2, but were clearly the quietest. All eyes were on Sweden and their young (16-year-old) skip Eriksson, while Canada's William Dion earned first-place honours in the round-robin.

But it was the U.S. which gathered momentum through the playoffs, dispatching Norway in the Page 3 versus 4 playoff game and upsetting Canada in the semifinal.

It was a day of double disappointment for Sweden, as women's skip Cissi Ostlund came out flat against a resurgent Scotland to lose the ladies' final 12-3. It was the fourth consecutive men's silver medal in a row for Sweden, while Swedish junior women have won four silvers this decade, in addition to one gold (in 2000) and two bronze.

Canada's Dion, like his women's counterpart Kaitlyn Lawes, recovered from a crushing loss in the semifinals to win the bronze medal. The Canadians took out Norway's Kristian Rolvsfjord 5-3 by scoring five singles in the match, including a steal of one in the second end. Rolvsfjord was held to just three singles, including a missed double attempt for two in the ninth end.

"That was our game," said Dion. "That's exactly how we did it at provincials, at nationals, all year. if we had done that yesterday, we would have been on the middle sheet today."

"A lot of people told me it's easier here than in Canada, but it's not. This is tougher. We didn't see these teams in Canada.

"It's a super great experience. It's great to be third in the world. It's much better than fourth."

Throughout the week, Curlingkanalen.se (which means "curling maniacs" in Swedish) webstreamed live games via the internet, while the playoff rounds saw Eurosport.se also pick up the Curlingkanalen feed.

Next year's 2009 World Juniors will be hosted at the official 2010 Olympic and Paralympic curling venue in Vancouver, Canada.

FINAL STANDINGS

United States                    10-2 - Gold
Sweden                             8-3 - Silver
Canada                              8-4 - Bronze
Norway                              6-6
Switzerland (Manuel Ruch)   5-5
Germany (Daniel Neuner)     4-5
Denmark (Rasmus Stjerne)    4-5
China (Jialang Zang)            3-6
Scotland (Glen Muirhead)     2-7 - Scotland must qualify for 2009 World Jrs
Czech Republic                  1-8 - Czech Republic must qualify for 2009 World Jrs

OSTERSUND – Scotland won its second straight global junior women's title with a 12-3 thrashing of hosts Sweden at the 2008 World Junior Curling Championships.

Seventeen year-old Eve Muirhead and teammates Kerry Barr, Vicki Adams, Kay Adams and Sarah Macintyre had lost two previous games to Sweden's Cissi Ostlund, including Saturday's 8-2 defeat in the semifinal. In the final, it was all Scotland, all the time as Muirhead's troops scored two in the second end, stole another two in the third, and stole a whopping six points in the sixth frame.

"It feels really good," said a nonchalant Muirhead, who shrugged off spectator chants to "kiss the ice" after the match.

"We knew early on if we could just stay on top of things we'd be fine."

Muirhead and Macintyre won the 2007 world junior crown with skip Sarah Reid. It marked the first back-to-back global junior women's victories for Scotland since Gillian Barr and Kirsty Hay turned the trick in 1992 and 1993, respectively.

Altrnate Kay Adams stepped in to replace her sister Vicki on the eve of the playoffs, after Vicki suffered a fall and injured her leg.

"It was really hard at the time but Kate played really, really well," said Muirhead.

Murihead's brother Glen skipped the men's team in Ostersund, which suffered an entirely different result. Scotland's junior men finished 2-7 and will have to survive next year's European Junior Challenge tournament in Taarnby, Denmark.

Ostlund had an impressive week in claiming silver. Sweden had not qualified for the World Juniors and would not have been competing if they were not the host nation of this year's championship.

The bronze medal went to Canada's Kaitlyn Lawes, who bravely shrugged off a challenging week – and a 5-0 deficit after three ends - to defeat Russia 9-8 to finish third.

Lawes stole a huge three points in the fifth end and following a Russian steal in the seventh, the Canadians grabbed another three in the eighth. In the final end, Russian skip Liudmila Privivkova missed a hit and roll attempt and Canada confirmed their winning deuce without having to throw their final stone.

"I'm just a little relieved," said Lawes.

"It's been such an amazing experience. We're so happy we're able to come here and medal."

The Russians, who won the 2006 World Junior women's title, stole three points in the third end to build their 5-0 lead.

"Oh geez, I'm not sure what happened," said Lawes. "My rock just didn't curl in a spot where it had been curling."

Lawes said the world event was an eye-opener for her squad.

"It's unreal, there's nothing like it whatsoever," said Lawes.

"They say it's so hard to come out of Canada, but all these European teams are phenomenal. They're awesome. Everyone here deserves to be here."

Norway and Germany finished at the bottom of the standings and will have to qualify for the 2009 World Juniors from the 2009 European Junior Challenge.

Next year's World Junior Curling Championship will be hosted at the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic venue in Vancouver, Canada.

FINAL STANDINGS

Scotland                               9-3 – Gold

Sweden                                8-3 – Silver

Canada                                 7-6 – Bronze

Russia                                   7-5 

Denmark (Madeleine Dupont)   5-5

Switzerland (Michele Jaeggi)   4-5

Japan (Satsuki Fujisawa)          3-6

United States (Nina Spatola)    3-6

Norway (Anneline Skarsmoen)  3-6 – Norway must qualify for 2009 Worlds

Germany (Frederike Templin)  2-7 - Germany must qualify for 2009 Worlds

OSTERSUND – Scotland and the United States won semifinal berths into Sunday's championship finals of the 2008 World Junior Curling Championships.

In a battle of the previous two World Junior champions, Scotland's Eve Muirhead upended Russia's Liudmila Privivkova 7-6 to advance to Sunday's final against Sweden. The Scots stole a key point in the sixth end and added a huge three-ender in the eighth to assure the victory. In the final end, Muirhead made a takeout against three Russian stones to allow a meaningless steal of two.

"It's really exciting," said Muirhead, who won gold last year under skip Sarah Reid in Eveleth, USA.

"We've had two really good games with Sweden so far and if we can just play the way we can, we should do fine."

Scottish lead Sarah Macintyre made a stellar soft split shot in the final end, and briefly knelt to lick the ice.

"(My teammates) told me if I made the tick shot I have to lick the ice," said Macintyre, who was also a member of the 2007 championship team. "I wasn't going to do it but they made me. And it turns out nobody saw it, not my skip or the coaches.

"If we win tomorrow, (Eva) has to kiss the ice."

Russia meets Canada's Kaitlyn Lawes in Sunday morning's bronze medal game at 09.30 Central Europe Time.

In the men's semifinal, Canada's William Dion missed his last shot for the second time in two games to lose 8-6 to Chris Plys of the United States. Canada stole two in the sixth for a brief 5-3 lead but the Americans roared back with a three-count in the very next end.

In the 10th end, Dion faced the same situation as his earlier Page 1 versus 2 playoff against Sweden: take two for the victory, or score one to force the extra end. And for the second straight game, Dion was in trouble early in the frame.

"That's a real bad day," said Dion, who needed several minutes in the locker room to compose himself.

"We had a real bad first game, and this game... we didn't really have any bad calls, but my last shot picked. We tried to play it safe and we couldn't make a double peel. Same situation both games, and we just couldn't do anything."

Like the Canadian women's team, Dion's troops must come out hungry for the bronze medal.

"All the guys have to eat this up," said Dion. "We came here to win the gold, no other consideration, but at this point we have to win the bronze. We can't go home without a medal.

"The hardest thing is we're going to remember this game for the rest of our lives. You have to lose big before you can learn how to win, right? That was lose huge. Humungous. That was horrible."

For Plys, the win takes his team into the World Junior final against a solid but young home team from Sweden.

"I've worked my whole life for this," said Plys.

"After Aanders' (third player Brorson's) second guard in the 10th I thought, 'oh my God, we might steal this thing'."

Located directly across the street from the athlete's hotel is a popular American-based submarine sandwich shop – an odd sight in this small winter sport-crazed town in northwest Sweden.

"It's Subway tonight and tomorrow, I think," said Plys. "We've been keeping those guys in business. Every time we walk by the place, it's full of curling teams."

Sunday's gold medal championship matches (14.00 CST) can be viewed through curlingkanalen.se or eurosport.se.