Scott Andrews bound for Junior Worlds
10th February 2010
Prestwick’s Scott Andrews is bound for the World Junior Curling Championships in Flims, Switzerland (March 6-14) after helping Team Fraser win the Scottish Junior title in Aberdeen yesterday.
Team Fraser, made up of Andrews, skip Ally Fraser (Inverness), Steven Mitchell (Perth) and Kerr Drummond (Forfar), completed an undefeated week with a 9-4 win over pre-event favourites, Perth's Glen Muirhead.
“It’s about five years since a team got through the week without losing a match,” said 20 year old Andrews, who had also been in the winning team two years ago. “Especially with the high standard of teams there are now, it’s a lot harder to do.
“We started the week hoping to get into the final and we knew that if we got there we could probably win it if we played our best. We had a great week, played really well and it’s brilliant to come out on top. This is my last year as a junior so it’s great to win.”
Andrews is supported by the National Academy, which has been created to identify and build a wider base of potential curlers capable of challenging for a place in the Elite Squad.
The West of Scotland Institute of Sport, part of the sportscotland institute of sport’s regional network, provides integrated support in the form of high performance expertise. Its expert teams work together to support Scottish governing body-identified athletes, delivering essential support services locally in sports medicine, sports science, strength and conditioning, and career and lifestyle guidance.
The combination of the two has proved a winning formula.
“This year our off ice work has been as good as our on ice training,” said Andrews. “The team and communications have been great and we get on really well. We fight right to the end and never give up.
“The Academy on ice sessions once a week with Brad Askew have been a great help. The supervised sessions of Strength & Conditioning training with the institute at Kilmarnock twice a week every week this year have made a huge difference. I’m more stable, fitter and was able to last the whole week without getting fatigued.
“There were 10 games, that’s up to three hours twice a day, and by the end of the week you are quite tired but It shows at the end of the week the teams that have trained and are able to last.”
Team Fraser has three weeks of training to look forward to before heading to Switzerland for the World Championships. Having three members of the team who already have Worlds experience from a year ago will be a huge advantage.
“In the Worlds two years ago we didn’t have a good week and we came ninth,” said Andrews. “That first year we were a bit blown away but this time we have a bit more experience because three of us have already been to the competition.
“That will hopefully give us the advantage because there are a lot of other countries whose main teams didn’t win their junior championships this year. They have underdogs playing so that could be to our advantage.
“If we play the way we were playing then there is no reason why we can’t medal.”
