The Vancouver Olympics are winding up, but attention will soon be all on the Paralympic Games. Here's a piece to promote our team on the ice next month:The all-Scottish Great Britain wheelchair curling team were given a rousing send off from their home rink yesterday, before heading to Canada to compete in the 2010 Paralympic Winter Games. And as they met supporters and well-wishers at the Braehead Curling Rink - where the team train and play the club matches - skip Michael McCreadie said, “We’re quietly confident of bringing home the gold medals.”
Joining Michael, from Lochwinnoch, Renfrewshire, in the GB Paralympics curling team are Tom Killin, from Edinburgh; Angie Malone, from Girvan, South Ayrshire; Aileen Neilson, from Strathaven, Lanarkshire and Jim Sellar, from Bellshill, in Lanarkshire. The GB wheelchair curling team, which included Michael, Tom and Angie, won a silver medal at the last Paralympics, in Turin, Italy in 2006.
But in Vancouver, next month the GB wheelchairs curlers are aiming to go one better. Michael continued, “If we play at our best we will be a real handful for any country in the world. “I know it’s a football cliché, but we’ll be taking it one game at a time and let’s hope we’ll end up with gold medals to bring home. We can’t wait to get out there and start competing. You can’t put into words how it feels putting on that GB tracksuit and representing your country.”
He added, “The GB Paralympic teams work just as hard all year round and prepare for our winter games just as much as the competitors who are presently out in Vancouver for the Winter Olympics.”
Braehead leisure manager, Bruce Harley said, “The skill, passion and determination of these wheelchair curlers is fantastic and I see these qualities week in week out when they play at Braehead. We’ll be rooting for them when the competition starts and I’ve no doubt we’ll be having a big welcome home event at the curling rink when the team comes back clutching gold medals in their hands.”
L-R: Jim Sellar, Angie Malone, Michael McCreadie, Aileen Neilson and Tom Killin. Photo is courtesy Macdonald Media.
