What a rollercoaster week it’s been.
And it’s not over yet, thankfully!
Before you come to the Olympics, you prepare yourself for the probability of a lot of highs and lows.
The round-robin format is made for that.
If you’d asked me before our competition began, I’d have said five wins and four losses would give us a good chance of getting into the medal play-offs.
The field was so strong, pretty much from top to bottom, there was always the prospect of it being bunched.
Six and three is the mark that makes life easier but I’ve got a habit of doing it the hard way!
What I certainly wouldn’t choose is going into the final set of games knowing that even if we won, it might not have been enough.
You always want to be in total control of your destiny.
But it wasn’t luck that got us through – it’s a nine-game tournament and the last of those nine is every bit as important as the first.
It’s about dealing with the do or die pressure and we did that.
WE ARE GOING TO THE SEMI ❤️❤️❤️❤️ https://t.co/2UqFqiAWQj
— Team Muirhead (@Team_Muirhead) February 17, 2022
I’d like to think experience helped me and the team.
It’s impossible to totally blank out what is happening across the ice but focusing on your own game is huge.
I knew that Sweden and Switzerland were the ‘expected’ winners of the other matches that mattered to us – and thankfully they came through.
Watching it play-out after we’d won wasn’t easy, mind you! That was the hardest bit of the day.
In the end it came down to which two out of ourselves, Canada and Japan ranked highest in the draw shot challenge – which we do at the start of every game.
Draw shot debate
It’s a controversial way to separate teams.
In Canadian events tie-breaker matches are still used to decide play-off spots but not at World Curling Federation ones.
Things like TV scheduling at an Olympics are a factor in the planning.
At the moment, I’m a big fan!
We all know how important it’s likely to be and we practiced a lot on it back in Scotland.
It actually helped us get to Beijing through the quickest route at the Olympic qualifying event too so that practice has paid off big-time in the last couple of months.
Before today’s play-offs the odds were against us so that will free us up.
‘Just go for it’ will be the mindset now.
I’ve got good and bad memories of semi-finals at the Olympics so this won’t be a situation that will faze me.
And I know my curling history.
When Rhona Martin won gold back in 2002 it was a very similar situation – reliant on a result to get into the semis with a 5-4 record.
Twenty years later, let’s hope history repeats itself!
I’m off social media but I have heard the chat about Elise Christie hoping to make it back in 2026.
She has been a big part of Team GB and I know the public back home have missed not watching her here.
It goes to show – once you’ve got the Olympic bug you really don’t want to be anywhere else!
