Scotland’s Hammy McMillan and Bruce Mouat in 2023 © World Curling / Steve Seixeiro

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World Curling Media

26 March 2024

World Men’s set to begin in Schaffhausen

With this season’s BKT Tires World Women’s Championship now successfully concluded in Sydney, Canada, the World Curling action now moves to Europe.

The LGT World Men’s Curling Championship 2024 is set to be staged at the IWC Arena in Schaffhausen, Switzerland, from Saturday 30 March to Sunday 7 April.

Schaffhausen is a historic town, situated one hour north of Zürich, and this is the first World Curling championship to be held there.

The world men’s championship dates back to 1959, and altogether 13 of the top men’s teams will be representing their national Member Associations at this event.

With Switzerland gaining participation as hosts, the other teams qualified through two different routes; by way of their performances in the Le Gruyère AOP European Curling Championships, held in November 2023 in Aberdeen, Scotland, and at the Pan Continental Championships, staged in Kelowna, Canada earlier in November 2023.

From the Le Gruyère AOP European Curling Championships (in qualification order): Scotland, Sweden, Italy, Norway, Germany, Netherlands and Czechia.

From the Pan Continental Championships (in qualification order): Canada, Korea, Japan, United States and New Zealand.

Team New Zealand at the world championship in 2023 © World Curling / Céline Stucki

As well as having world titles and medals on the line, this event is the first of two Olympic qualifier world championships. With Italy already qualified as hosts, altogether seven national Member Associations will qualify directly for the 2026 Olympic Winter Games in Milan-Cortina. The others will be eligible to compete at a Pre-Olympic Qualification Event and/or the final Olympic Qualification Event, held in the 2025–2026 season.

Reigning Olympic champions, Sweden © World Curling / Steve Seixeiro

Meet the teams

  • Canada: Skip Brad Gushue – a world champion and three-time world silver medallist – leads his team to a third successive appearance.
  • Czechia: skipped by Lukas Klima, this is a third successive world appearance for this team. They will be looking to improve on their best performance so far, ninth in 2022.
  • Germany: skip Marc Muskatewitz leads a young team of world junior silver medallists. Muskatewitz himself will be making a sixth appearance, but three members of this team are debuting.
  • Italy: skipped by experienced Joel Retornaz, this team has consistently performed at the top of the rankings throughout this season. Making his tenth appearance, Retornaz will be hoping to improve on the bronze medal he won in 2022.
  • Japan: skipped by Shimizu Tetsuro, who, having first competed at the 2009 championship, is making a ninth appearance.
  • Korea: this is a new combination skipped by Park Jongduk, who is making a second appearance.
  • Netherlands: skipped by Wouter Goesgens, who leads a team making its sixth appearance.
  • New Zealand: skipped by Anton Hood, this team will be hoping to improve on last year’s 13th place on their second appearance at this level.
  • Norway: skip Magnus Ramsfjell is making a fourth appearance and will be hoping to improve on last year’s fifth place.
  • Scotland: the defending champions and Olympic silver medallists, who are also the current European champions, skipped by Bruce Mouat on his fifth appearance.
  • Sweden: the Olympic champions, skipped by Niklas Edin, who has won this title six times and is making a 13th appearance.
  • Switzerland: last year’s bronze medallists, skipped by Yannick Schwaller, who is making a third appearance.
  • United States: skipped by 2018 Olympic champion John Shuster, who is making an 11th appearance, hoping to improve on last year’s eighth place.
Canada’s Brad Gushue © World Curling / Céline Stucki

Playing schedule and format

There will be 20 sessions of round-robin play, commencing on Saturday 30 March and concluding on Friday 5 April. This will determine the top six-ranked teams. The teams ranked top and second will proceed directly to the semi-finals. For teams ranked third to sixth, qualification games will take place at 10:00 on Saturday 6 April (3rd v 6th and 4th v 5th). Semi-finals will follow on the same day at 16:00.

The bronze medal game and then the gold medal final will be staged on Sunday 7 April, at 10:00 and 15:00, respectively.

All times are Central European Summer Time (CEST), except for 30 March, which is Central European Time (CET). CEST is UTC+2 hours, while CET is UTC+1 hour.

All games will be available to watch on The Curling Channel. Geo-blocking may be in place.

Select games can be viewed internationally on the following: Canada, (TSN), Japan (NHK), Switzerland (SRG), Sweden (SVT), Korea (JTBC), Scotland (BBC), China (CCTV), Czechia (Česká televize) and Polsat (Poland). Some games will be available on Eurosport International and the Olympic Channel. For more details, consult the broadcasters’ programme.

Find the full playing schedule here.

LGT will once again hold a top shots competition. More information about it will be posted on our social media channels soon. The voting will open after the championship.

Engage with World Curling in the lead up to the LGT World Men’s Curling Championship 2024 on TikTok, Twitter/X, Instagram, Facebook, and Weibo and by searching the hashtags #WMCC and #curling

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