In a sunburned country, with no ice to call their own, Australian curlers Tahli Gill and Dean Hewitt were left to practice their sport’s legendary sweeping in the most ironic of places: Their kitchens.
While sweeping their tiled floors was a less-than-ideal substitute for sweeping the painstakingly prepared ice of a curling rink, the duo still managed to do what no other Australian curler ever has: Snag a spot at the Olympics. Their historic bid for an Olympic medal in the sport’s mixed doubles event comes despite being the only curlers competing in Beijing without a designated curling rink in their home country.
