Winter Youth Olympic Games Gangwon 2024: How to watch curling at the 2024 YOG
Discover the schedule and all the top facts you need to know about curling at the next Winter Youth Olympic Games Gangwon 2024.
Curling
We're just under a year away from the fourth Winter Youth Olympic Games and the first to be held in Asia: Gangwon 2024.
The South Korean province, which also hosted the Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018, will welcome the world's best young athletes on ice and snow in January 2024.
Every winter Olympic sport, including curling, is on the programme.
Discover all the essentials you need to know about curling at Gangwon 2024 as we begin the countdown towards the Opening Ceremony on 19 January 2024.
Curling at Gangwon 2024: Schedule and venue
Many venues used for the Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018 are being re-used for Gangwon 2024, and it's no different for curling.
The Gangneung Curling Centre, which hosted curling during PyeongChang 2018 and saw Team Shuster of the United States and Team Hasselborg of Sweden win Olympic gold, will be for used for Gangwon 2024.
Two curling events will take place over the course of the Games: a mixed team competition and a mixed doubles competition.
The schedule will be as follows:
- Day 0 (20 January 2024) - Mixed Team Official Training
- Day 1 (21 January 2024) - Mixed Team Round Robin
- Day 2 (22 January 2024) - Mixed Team Round Robin
- Day 3 (23 January 2024) - Mixed Team Round Robin
- Day 4 (24 January 2024) - Mixed Team Round Robin
- Day 5 (25 January 2024) - Mixed Team Round Robin and Quali-Games
- Day 6 (26 January 2024) - Mixed Team Semifinals and Medal Matches
- Day 7 (27 January 2024) - MD Official Training and Session 1
- Day 8 (28 January 2024) - MD Sessions 2, 3 and 4
- Day 9 (29 January 2024) - MD Sessions 5, 6 and 7
- Day 10 (30 January 2024) - MD Sessions 8, 9 and 10
- Day 11 (31 January 2024) - MD Sessions 11, 12 and 13
- Day 12 (1 February 2024) - MD Sessions 14, 15 and Quarterfinals
- Day 13 (2 February 2024) - MD Semifinals and Medal Matches
Curling at Gangwon 2024: Events and format
Two events will be contested in curling at Gangwon 2024:
- Mixed Team
- Mixed Doubles
It will be the fourth time that curling is included at the Winter Youth Olympic Games having been reinstated as an Olympic sport back in 1998.
Teams - comprised of two or four players - each take turns to slide stones on a sheet of ice toward a target area, known as the house, which is segmented into four concentric circles.
Brooms are used to help adjust the stone's movement as it travels across the ice. The team with the closest stone(s) to the centre of the house wins the end. One point is earned for every stone closer than an opponent's closest stone.
The number of stones thrown per team in each end will differ across the two events. In the Mixed Team, eight stones are thrown with a match typically last 10 ends, unless the end is forfeited.
In Mixed Doubles, the format is faster-paced with each time throwing only five stones per end. However, teams get to place an extra stone before the start of each end.
Unlike in previous Winter YOGs the Mixed Doubles competition will feature one male and one female from the same NOC.
How to qualify for curling at Gangwon 2024 Winter Youth Olympic Games
The are a total of 112 quota spots for curling at Gangwon 2024, with 56 for men and 56 for women.
Each NOC is permitted to have one team for the Mixed Team event and one team for the Mixed Doubles event. The maximum number of athletes per NOC will be set to six (three men and three women).
To qualify, an NOC must enter at least one team into the World Junior Curling Championships (WJCC) OR World Junior B Curling Championships (WJBCC) during the qualification period, or has to have participated in the 2022 World Curling Academy Youth Training Programme.
NOCs will then be awarded points based on the finishing position of their Member Associations during the WJCC and the WJBCC during the competition season of 2022-2023. The points from the Junior Men’s and Junior Women’s events at the WJCC and WJBCC will be added together to create the YOG Ranking List.
A total of 14 Mixed Team quotas will be allocated based on the YOG Ranking List, following the distribution of quotas per qualifying zone below:
- Three best-ranked NOCs from Americas
- Two best-ranked NOCs from Asia
- One best-ranked NOC from Oceania
- One best-ranked NOC from Africa
- Six best-ranked NOCs from Europe f
- One team from the NOC of the Host Country.
The remaining two quotas will be allocated to the highest-ranked NOCs not yet qualified on the YOG Ranking List regardless of qualifying zone.
For Mixed Doubles 18 Mixed Double team quotas will be allocated based on the YOG Ranking List, following the distribution of quotas per qualifying zone below:
- Three best-ranked NOCs from Americas
- Two best-ranked NOCs from Asia (excluding *West-Asia)
- One best-ranked NOC from the *West Asia region
- One best-ranked NOC from Oceania
- Nine best-ranked NOCs from Europe
- One best-ranked NOC from Africa
- One team from the NOC of the Host Country
The remaining six quotas will be allocated to the highest-ranked NOCs not yet qualified on the YOG Ranking List regardless of qualifying zone.
To be eligible to participate in the Winter Youth Olympic Games Gangwon 2024, athletes must have been born between 1 January 2006 and 31 December 2009.
The curling qualification period will take place from February 2022 to 31 December 2023.
For more information on curling qualification at Gangwon 2024, click here.
Winter Youth Olympic Games curling – previous stars
Rasmus Wranaa of Sweden was part of the inaugural Winter YOG curling cohort that competed at Innsbruck 2012, the inaugural Winter YOG and has since graduated on to some of the sport's biggest prizes.
As a member of the legendary Team Edin, Wrana is now a three-time European champion, four-time World champion and currently, the reigning Olympic champion from Beijing 2022, having upgraded on his silver from PyeongChang 2018.
Italy's history-making Olympic champions Stefania Constantini and Amos Mosaner are other examples of YOG alumni who have gone on to strike the big time.
The pair both represented their country at Innsbruck 2012, with Mosaner walking away with silver in the Mixed Team event.