Champions Canada reign supreme at Women's World Curling Championships

Led by skip Rachel Homan, the Canadians were a cut above the rest of the competition in Beijing, rounding off matters with an 8-3 win over Russia in Sunday's final.

Their opponents were making their first appearance in the gold medal match but it was Canada who came out on top to become the first team to lift the brand new World Curling Championship trophy – commissioned for the World Curling Federation's 50th anniversary.

Canada opened the scoring in the second end with a draw by Homan for two points and built on that with a single-point steal in the third end. After blanking the fourth end, Russia – led by skip Anna Sidorova – got on the scoreboard with a single point in the fifth end.

But Canada responded with three points in the sixth to take a 6-1 lead although Canada refused to give in with two points in the seventh end reducing the lead to 6-3.

But that was as good as it got for the Russians as a final draw by Homan in the eighth gave Canada another two points for 8-3, and Russia conceded.

Homan was joined in receiving her gold medal by vice-skip Emma Miskew, second Joanne Courtney, lead Lisa Weagle and alternate Cheryl Kreviazuk and said afterwards: "It's pretty amazing [to be world champion].

"We worked so hard for this! We've been in this [World Championship] four times so it's finally exciting to be able to bring the gold back for Canada.

"We just wanted to bring back the gold no matter how we did it. That's what's most important right now, so we're going to go out and celebrate."

Sportsbeat 2017