#1
Date: Wed, 19 Mar 2003 15:49:08 -0500
From: Jeff Timson, Media Director, St. Clair Group
Subject: 2003 World Juniors
WORLD JUNIOR CURLING CHAMPIONSHIPS START SATURDAY IN SWITZERLAND
March 19, 2003 The World Junior Curling Championships get underway
Saturday in Flims, Switzerland. Ten men's and 10 women's teams will
play a round robin at the Sports Center Prau la Selva, followed by
playoff pairings featuring 1 vs 4 and 2 vs 3. The winners then
advance to their respective finals while the losers compete in bronze
medal contests.
TSN will carry the women's gold medal final live across Canada on
Saturday, March 29 at 10:00 am ET and the men's final Sunday, March
30 at 8:00 am ET.
Representing Canada will be two teams from Saskatoon, skipped by
Steve Laycock and Marliese Miller, who qualified by winning the
Karcher Juniors in Ottawa, February 1-9.
Laycock and his Sutherland Curling Club team of Christopher Haichert,
Michael Jantzen and Kyler Broad will be trying to give Canada a
leading 13th world junior men's title since 1975 and sixth in a row.
Last year in Kelowna, Manitoba's David Hamblin continued the streak
by defeating Sweden in the final.
Laycock will face, amongst others, last year's silver medallists from
Sweden, skipped by Eric Carlsén, as well as Denmark's 2001 silver
medallist Casper Bossen, Germany's Christian Baumann, the 2000 bronze
medallist and Japan's Hiroaki Kashiwagi, making his fifth appearance
at the world juniors.
Completing the men's field are Finland (Tuomas Vuori), Norway (Thomas
Løvold), Russia (Vadim Stebakov), Scotland (Keith MacLennan) and
Switzerland (Jan Hauser).
Miller and teammates Teejay Surik, Janelle Lemon and Chelsey Bell,
representing the Nutana Curling Club, are seeking a leading eighth
crown for Canada since 1988. Suzanne Gaudet of Prince Edward Island
won the world junior title in 2001 in Ogden, Utah and a bronze medal
in 2002 in Kelowna.
Miller, a silver medallist at the 2000 world juniors in Geising,
Germany while playing third for sister Stefanie Miller, will battle,
amongst others, the defending champion skip Cassandra Johnson of the
United States, who earned her country's first world junior women's
gold medal by defeating Sweden in last year's final. Also competing
is Italy's 18-year-old Diana Gaspari, the fourth place finisher last
year, who will also skip Italy at the upcoming Ford Worlds in
Winnipeg, April 5-13.
Rounding out the field are Germany (Juliane Jacoby), Japan (Ai
Kobayashi), Norway (Linn Githmark), Russia (Liudmila Privivkova),
Scotland (Rachael Simms), Sweden (Stina Viktorsson) and Switzerland
(Valeria Spälty). The Swedish team includes third Lisa Löfskog and
lead Jenny Hammarström, world junior gold medallists in 2000 and
silver medallists in 2001 and 2002.
Up-to-the-minute results can be obtained at www.curling.ca and
wjcc.curlit.com.
Jeff Timson
Media Director, St. Clair Group
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