28 April 2025
Olympic dreams drive longtime friends Mouat and Dodds at World Championship
Bruce Mouat, recently crowned world men’s team champion for a second time, and Jennifer Dodds, reigning Olympic women’s team champion, are representing Scotland at this year’s World Mixed Doubles Curling Championship – a title they previously won together in 2021.
When speaking with them, it’s clear they are determined to achieve two goals this week: first, to secure a qualification slot for Great Britain in next year’s Olympic Mixed Doubles competition; and second, to do enough to earn selection for that slot themselves, ahead of other athletes in the Scottish/British Curling elite programme.
Both athletes are already part of teams that have secured British Olympic qualification in the team events for next year’s Games in Cortina, Italy. Bruce says, “it would be nice to have a busy February next year — that’s the goal.”
While many partnerships in the Mixed Doubles event feature married couples, life partners, or siblings, few teams have as long a history as the Scottish duo.
Mouat and Dodds grew up together, meeting as schoolchildren at the Gogar Park Young Curlers Club in Edinburgh — Bruce was 10, and Jennifer was 7. Now, they are both highly successful members of the British Curling programme, training at Scotland’s National Curling Academy in Stirling.
Despite their current success at this year’s championship, their path in Mixed Doubles hasn’t always been smooth. Bruce explains, “we were last here two years ago and finished fifth. Last year, we didn’t get through the Scottish qualifier, but now we’ve blanked that out of our minds!”
With steady wins through the round-robin stages, this year’s story is shaping up differently. Jennifer says, “I think we’re in the position everyone involved in Mixed Doubles wants to be in. We all want to be in the team that’s representing Scotland and trying to get that qualification for GB. That’s our goal – to qualify, and hopefully represent Team GB at the Olympics, if we get that qualification.”
Currently, Scotland/Great Britain sit seventh in the qualification rankings from last year. Bruce notes, “Duncan (McFadzean) and Sophie (Jackson) did a great job last year to put us in a good spot, so we’re feeling we just have to get into the top three in our group. If we do that, we should get qualification for GB, and then it’ll all go down to selection for who is going to be the actual team.”
If Jennifer and Bruce achieve their aims this week, they’ll have no bigger supporters than their friends and rivals within the Scottish/British elite programme, despite any personal disappointment among other squad members.
There is clearly a strong bond within the squad, alongside healthy competition. Jennifer explains, “there is a good environment in the whole British Curling squad. Everyone has that rivalry but we all get on well and mix among the different teams when we’re off the ice.”
Bruce adds, “the squad all train together in the same venues almost every day, mostly on the ice in Stirling. And we go to the gym together, so we still see each other almost every day. We’ve had lots of communication about Mixed Doubles and we’ve had a lot of games within the National Curling Academy.”
Jennifer also shared how the squad structures their training to accommodate both team and Mixed Doubles play.
She says, “we have set days when it’s either team or mixed doubles practice. It depends on the schedule. If we have more mixed doubles competitions coming up, then we’ll concentrate more on that, but if we’ve got a good chunk of team play, then we’ll concentrate on that. It’s a fine balance but this year there’s been a lot of mixed doubles competitions.”
At the last Olympic Winter Games in Beijing, Jennifer and Bruce narrowly missed the Mixed Doubles podium, finishing fourth, before Jennifer went on to win gold with Eve Muirhead’s women’s team and Bruce led the men’s team to a silver medal.
With the Scottish/British teams continuing to produce results, few would bet against the odds of more medal success in Cortina.
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