Brazilian curling team wins for the first time at the Winter Olympics – 01/22/2024 – Sport

After Brazil won the first medal in its history at the Winter Youth Olympic Games, which are being held in Gangwon, South Korea, the country achieved another feat in the competition by winning, in the early hours of this Monday (22) , the first curling victory.

The Brazilian team formed by Rafaela Ladeira, 17, Julia Gentile, 15, Guilherme Melo, 15 and Pedro Ribeiro, 14, defeated Germany 6-4 in the fourth round of Group B in the mixed team competition.

“There are no words to describe this moment. We’ve cried, we’ve laughed, we’ve cursed, it’s something we’ll never forget,” team leader Rafaela Ladeira told Olympics.com.

“It’s a great emotion, we worked for 15 months with a lot of training. People don’t realize how much you need to work to get here and win. We had a difficult start, but today we can show that our potential is great”, said the coach Isis Oliveira.

Brazil’s positive result in the sport came after three defeats in the tournament — against South Korea (17 x 1), Canada (14 x 0) and Denmark (14 x 1). The Brazilian team will still play three more matches in the first phase against Switzerland, Italy and Great Britain.

This is the Brazilian curling team’s third participation in the Winter Youth Olympic Games. In their debut, in Lillehammer-2016, there were seven defeats and five points scored. In Lausanne-2020, five more defeats, with nine points scored.

Known as “chess on ice”, curling involves throwing stones at a target. The sport is known for the use by players of a type of broom that serves to make the ice smoother and allow the pieces to move more easily.

Curling began to be practiced in the mid-16th century, on the frozen lakes of Scotland. He was part of the first edition of the Winter Games, in 1924, but only returned to the Olympic program in 1998.