Canada's Kelly Scott is proving to be the class of the field early on at the 2007 World Women's Curling Championship in Aomori, the first adult world titleshoot ever hosted in Asia.

Scott bested her two main rivals, defending world and Olympic champion Anette Norberg of Sweden and 2006 finalist Debbie McCormick of the United States, on a critical day at the Aomori Prefecture Skating Rink venue.

Meanwhile, Japan's Moe Meguro missed easy draws for the win in both the 10th and 11th ends to lose 7-6 to Russia, and missed a chance at sole possession of second place. The Russians exulted as the sold-out crowd groaned in dismay. Scott defeated Norberg 7-5 and McCormick 8-4 to move to 4-0 and a hold on first place.

"That was a big game for us," said Scott. "It was important for us to know that we can beat this team."

Scott was 0-3 lifetime versus Norberg heading into the match, and had rarely competed abroad prior to last fall. Last year's world bronze medallist had told the media prior to the worlds that she had a "bag of tricks" ready for the Swedish champions. But when asked about it, Scott admitted the difference - and Sunday's victory - were due to old-fashioned hard work. And Scott, a decorated high-performance competitor, seemed not to mind a basic training approach that any amateur club curler would choose.

"We went to Europe (in January) and international competition helped," Scott explained. "But we've really worked on our mechanics, we've worked hard to improve. "We've worked on our strategy, our technical approach, a whole bunch of things."

For Norberg, it was simply a bad day at the office.

"We deserved to lose," said the tall skip, never one to mince words.
"We had two or three bad rocks, and it took a while to figure out what was wrong. They fooled me a bit."

The Japanese, media starlets ever since their impressive run of wins at last year's Olympic Winter Games in Turin, lost their second match 9-3 to Kelly Wood's Scottish foursome to fall to 2-2, tied with the United States. Four teams -Sweden, Scotland, China and Denmark - share second place at 3-1. Four teams - Russia, the Czech Republic, Germany and Switzerland - have one win while Italy, the European finalists just four months ago, are struggling at 0-4.

The Swiss won their first by defeating the Czechs 11-7 after alternate Mirjam Ott, the skip who led Switzerland to Olympic gold in both 2002 and 2006, came off the bench to skip the team and throw third stones.
 

Lenka Danielisova (CZE), Team Japan, Jackie Lockhardt (SCO)

Yin Liu (CHN), Mirjam Ott (SUI)