Calendar An icon of a desk calendar. Cancel An icon of a circle with a diagonal line across. Caret An icon of a block arrow pointing to the right. Email An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of the Facebook "f" mark. Google An icon of the Google "G" mark. Linked In An icon of the Linked In "in" mark. Logout An icon representing logout. Profile An icon that resembles human head and shoulders. Telephone An icon of a traditional telephone receiver. Tick An icon of a tick mark. Is Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes. Is Not Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes with a diagonal line through it. Pause Icon A two-lined pause icon for stopping interactions. Quote Mark A opening quote mark. Quote Mark A closing quote mark. Arrow An icon of an arrow. Folder An icon of a paper folder. Breaking An icon of an exclamation mark on a circular background. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Caret An icon of a caret arrow. Clock An icon of a clock face. Close An icon of the an X shape. Close Icon An icon used to represent where to interact to collapse or dismiss a component Comment An icon of a speech bubble. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Ellipsis An icon of 3 horizontal dots. Envelope An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Home An icon of a house. Instagram An icon of the Instagram logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. Magnifying Glass An icon of a magnifying glass. Search Icon A magnifying glass icon that is used to represent the function of searching. Menu An icon of 3 horizontal lines. Hamburger Menu Icon An icon used to represent a collapsed menu. Next An icon of an arrow pointing to the right. Notice An explanation mark centred inside a circle. Previous An icon of an arrow pointing to the left. Rating An icon of a star. Tag An icon of a tag. Twitter An icon of the Twitter logo. Video Camera An icon of a video camera shape. Speech Bubble Icon A icon displaying a speech bubble WhatsApp An icon of the WhatsApp logo. Information An icon of an information logo. Plus A mathematical 'plus' symbol. Duration An icon indicating Time. Success Tick An icon of a green tick. Success Tick Timeout An icon of a greyed out success tick. Loading Spinner An icon of a loading spinner. Facebook Messenger An icon of the facebook messenger app logo. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Facebook Messenger An icon of the Twitter app logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. WhatsApp Messenger An icon of the Whatsapp messenger app logo. Email An icon of an mail envelope. Copy link A decentered black square over a white square.

Curling: James Craik and Fay Henderson take inspiration from Scotland’s European champions

James Craik won the Scottish Curling Junior Championships in Aberdeen. Picture supplied by Perthshire Picture Agency.
James Craik won the Scottish Curling Junior Championships in Aberdeen. Picture supplied by Perthshire Picture Agency.

Scotland’s historic double European Curling Championship success last weekend has proved inspirational to the next generation, with both newly-crowned Scottish junior champions drawing upon the performances of Teams Mouat and Muirhead.

While the senior rinks were becoming the first Scots to claim men’s and women’s European titles on the same weekend, their British Curling colleagues Teams Craik and Henderson were battling for their own places in history at the Scottish Junior Championships at Curl Aberdeen and achieving their main season’s goals.

Team Craik and Team Henderson will represent Scotland at the World Junior Championships in Sweden in March as a reward for their success.

“Our teams had unbelievable success in Norway as a nation last weekend and to know that was happening when we were also on the ice rink created a really good atmosphere,” said James Craik.

“Everyone was in a positive mood and we felt that on the ice as well, everyone was cheering us on.

“Seeing the success Teams Mouat and Muirhead are having does give us great confidence when we’re travelling abroad, because we know we’re following the same programme as them, so if we keep doing what we’re doing, hopefully that can be us one day. ”

The victorious Team J Craik in Aberdeen: From left, Niall Ryder, Scott Hyslop, Angus Bryce, James Craik.

Fay Henderson echoed those sentiments, adding that their own successes at Curl Aberdeen reinforced their belief that they have given themselves a huge opportunity by earning places on the British Curling programme.

“To see the two Scotland teams win at the European Championships last weekend was inspirational and it shows what we can achieve as well with hard work and the support of British Curling,” she said.

“With James Craik winning as well on the boys side, I don’t think it’s any coincidence that what we’re doing is working and all the support we’ve been given has been very helpful and will help us perform on the world stage.”

It was a second victory as skip at the Scottish juniors for Craik, who hails from Edzell.

He added: “Going through the week unbeaten shows that we really are putting in the effort and training harder than anyone else and managing to get the results made a statement out there that we are the deserved winners and the best team to represent Scotland in Sweden.”

Having claimed bronze on both his previous appearances at the World Junior Championships, with Team Whyte in 2019, then with his own team the following year, Craik is determined to improve on that and believes his team is capable of doing so.

“That was our first trial run as a team at a championships and going undefeated in our nationals does give us a lot of confidence,” he said.

“We know we can play 10 games in a row and attack them all with the same diligence, attitude and performance standard, because our fitness is good enough.”

Fay Henderson was proud of her team after winning in Aberdeen.

Dumfries’s Henderson has a different immediate challenge as she and teammates Katie McMillan, Lisa Davie and Holly Wilkie-Milne also prepare to head for Scandinavia at the start of January for the World Junior B Championships, where they will be trying to get Scotland back to the top flight.

“This was our big target for the season, so it’s amazing to achieve it and I’m really proud of my team for the way we supported each other throughout the whole week. We played really well,” said the 19-year-old skip.

“I won the mixed doubles a couple of years ago, but to win a team event is the big one that everyone wants to win. It’s something I’ve worked towards for a very long time, so it’s great to be able to tick that off.”