Curling Olympians Vicky Wright and David Murdoch have been given MBEs by the Queen in her birthday honours this week.
Dumfries-born Vicky and Lockerbie’s David have both become Members of the British Empire for their services to the sport.
Vicky, 28, was the vice skip of Eve Muirhead’s rink which won gold at the Winter Olympics in Beijing in February.
She said: “I found out at the end of April – the letter came through to my mum and dad’s house.
“Fortunately I was catching up with family that weekend in Stranraer so I had the letter sitting there. My papa and granny were there at the time.
“It was unbelievable. It’s such an amazing honour and a massive surprise. You don’t expect it at all.
“Getting the gold medal and everything that has come after it is just overwhelming. It’s what you get recognised for and the hard work you’ve put into the sport that makes everything even more special.
“It’s been a crazy four months.”
Nurse Vicky announced her decision to retire from full-time curling last month and is due to marry fiancée Greg Drummond in the summer.
She added: “It was just my mum and dad, papa and granny and Greg that knew. It’s been really hard to not tell people.”
David Murdoch, the British curling team’s head coach, helped to oversee Team GB’s gold and silver medal success in February.
As a player, the 44-year-old won a silver medal in the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi and won two gold medals in the 2006 and 2009 World Championships and three European Championship gold medals in 2003, 2007 and 2008.
On being awarded the MBE, he said: “It’s not something you ever think about, is it?
“For me you’re so busy with your curling career as an athlete, and for me now as a head coach, that you’re focussed on doing the job at hand.
“These things are more an association of all of the efforts you’ve put in and I’m absolutely overwhelmed.
“I’m hugely honoured and privileged to be given the honour and it’s just testament to the long career in the sport.”
David added: “I’m hugely grateful to all of the people who have been a part of that whether it’s team-mates or coaching staff and even now the athletes the other way now that I’m head coach.
“I’m incredibly honoured to be given such a prestigious accolade.
“The letter came through when I was coaching abroad at a championship. My wife informed me because you had to accept it in a certain time period. That was a total shock! I was busy with the job and it was really hard to process and in some ways it still is.”
The other members of the Beijing team have also been honoured.
Skip Eve Muirhead received an OBE and Vicky’s other teammates Jennifer Dodds, Hailey Duff and Mili Smith were also awarded the MBE.
Scottish Secretary Alister Jack congratulated the medal recipients.
He said: “We were all gripped by the Winter Olympics and Paralympics in Beijing, as our curlers swept to gold and we topped the podium in Alpine
skiing.”
