ME 2022.
The 2022 European Curling Championships will take place in Őstersund, Sweden this year. The men play in Group A and will face nine national teams, including Spain and Turkey, as well as Scotland, Sweden and Italy. The women will meet the usual Estonians and Finns in Group B, but also the Spanish, Slovenes and Belgians. Both Czech teams had a traditionally tiring journey through European airports, with early wake-ups, several transfers, unpleasant delays, for me personally spiced up by meeting an eccentric, unempathic, linguistically unequipped young mother with a small child as a neighbour on the final flight. The travel woes are made up for by good accommodation with a hearty breakfast at the Clarion Hotel. Also, the encounters with many of our good friends are pleasant and evoke pre-Conquest times. Both national teams have had their pre-tournament training sessions and agree that the ice is of high quality and has top championship parameters. I.e., speed around 14.5 and a swing of 4.5 to 5.5 feet. We use public transportation to get between the rink and the hotel and so far it's working great. The men start Saturday morning with Switzerland and the women will meet the Lithuanians in the opening game. Snow-dusted Őstersund took over the organisation of the European Championships after Russia's right to host the European Championships was revoked. In less than five months since the change, the Swedes have welcomed 46 curling teams from 26 countries to the traditional bastion of biathlon competition and everything seems well managed and working.
