Ottawa – Silver medals at the last two wheelchair curling world championships have left Canada’s team hungry to climb that final step this year.
The 2025 worlds for the four-member mixed teams are set for March 1-8 in Stevenston, Scotland. That will be followed at the same venue by the mixed doubles worlds March 9-16. Mixed doubles will debut as a Paralympic Games event at Milano Cortina 2026.
‘’We’ve done really well with three silver medals at the last four worlds,’’ said Jon Thurston of Dunsford, Ont., who shoots last for Canada in the team event. ‘’Obviously we are hoping to change that to gold.” There’s been some tinkering to the Canadian line-ups for these worlds which are the final event to determine entries for the 2026 Games.
Gil Dash of Kipling, Sask., a second for Canada at the last two worlds, moves into the skip role and shoots third while Doug Dean of Thunder Bay, Ont. makes his worlds debut and Collinda Joseph of Stittsville, Ont. returns to the team event for the first time since 2020 as lead.
Fifth is Chrissy Molnar of Trent Lakes, Ont.
‘’The chemistry’s been good in training and whether it’s training camps or competitions we have played together before,” said Thurston. ‘’There’s familiarity, so now it’s about working on communication especially from an efficiency standpoint.”
There are 12 countries in the team event. In the preliminary round each team plays each other once. The top two advance directly to the semifinals while positions three to six battle for the other two final four spots.
Norway defeated Canada in the final last year while China was third.
The top nine countries in the Paralympic qualification points list after these championships earn a spot for the Games. Canada is comfortably ranked second, tied with China at 24 points – sitting just behind guaranteed entrant Italy as host country.
Big challenge for Canada in mixed doubles
For mixed doubles, Canada’s Paralympic Games qualifying situation is more precarious at the worlds tournament set for March 10-16.
It is the top seven in the Paralympic qualification points that gain a ticket to Italy. Canada is ranked seventh, four points behind Slovakia in sixth and currently one point ahead of Estonia and Japan.
For both mixed team and doubles, the points allocation at worlds is 14 for top spot, 12 for second, 10 for third, nine for fourth, eight for fifth and so on.
The Paralympic Games ranking is based on performances at the last three worlds.
Canada is fielding two of its most accomplished players to secure the mixed doubles spot in Scotland.
Four-time Paralympian Ina Forrest of Spallumcheen, B.C. and three-time Paralympian Mark Ideson of London, Ont. will compete at their first ever mixed doubles worlds.
‘’We are excited about the new challenge,’’ said Ideson, Canada’s skip at the previous five team worlds. ‘’Our goal at the beginning of this quadrennial was to qualify both teams for the 2026 Games.
‘’We’ve been playing and practicing. It’s an exciting discipline with a few more rocks in play. Ina and I have been on this team since 2013 and there’s a lot of trust and we work well together.”
South Korea, China and Italy were 1-2-3 at last year’s mixed doubles worlds. Italy gets a bye to the Games as host.
“We’ve had a great series of training camps in the lead up to this year’s world championships,” said Mick Lizmore, head coach of the national wheelchair program. “On top of that, athletes and their home coaches have been working hard to prepare themselves for the rigours of the competition awaiting us.”
Source: https://paralympic.ca/news/