International wheelchair curling returns to Lohja, Finland

The Kisakallio Sports Institute in Lohja, Finland will mark its return to hosting international curling with a vital competition in the Beijing 2022 Paralympic Winter Games qualification process.

The previously postponed World Wheelchair-B Curling Championship 2020 begins on Saturday 10 April 2021 in a COVID-secure environment and will see three teams secure a place in the World Wheelchair Curling Championship 2021 being held in Beijing, China, which will act as the final qualification event and official Test Event for the Games.

This will be the fifth time Lohja has hosted the Wheelchair-B Championship in recent years, after previously hosting in 2015, 2016, 2018 and 2019.

The Wheelchair-B Curling Championship 2020 will run from Saturday 10 April until Thursday 15 April and will host ten international teams: Czech Republic; Estonia; Finland; Germany; Hungary; Italy; Japan; Switzerland; Turkey; and United States.

The World Wheelchair-B Curling Championship is open to mixed gender teams from World Curling Federation Member Associations that have not yet qualified for the next World Wheelchair Curling Championship.

Round-robin play begins on Saturday 10 April at 14:30 and concludes at 18:30 on Wednesday 14 April.

The top four teams from the round-robin stage will progress to the semi-finals. The first ranked team from the round-robin will face the fourth ranked team in one semi-final, while the other semi-final will feature the second versus the third ranked teams.

Those semi-final games will take place on Thursday 15 April at 10:00 and are followed that afternoon at 15:00 with the bronze and gold medal games.

All three medal winning teams then receive a place in the World Wheelchair Curling Championship 2021.

All times are Eastern European Time (EEST), which is three hours ahead of Universal Coordinated Time (UTC).

Germany is skipped once again, by Paralympian Christiane Putzich. Putzich has competed in two Paralympic Games and five world championships for Germany. This will be her second World Wheelchair-B championship following a sixth-place finish in the 2019 event.

United States, skipped for the first time by Matthew Thums, will also feature Paralympian Stephen Emt at third position.

Switzerland will be skipped by Eric Decorvet for the first time after playing lead in the 2020 world championship alongside third player, Hans Burgner and second, Francoise Jaquerod. This is Switzerland’s first time competing in a World Wheelchair-B championship.

You can follow the World Wheelchair-B Curling Championship 2020 and the World Curling Federation on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Weibo and by searching the hashtags, #curling #WWhBCC2020 #Roadto2022