Curling competitions get underway as Olympic torch relay begins

The first competitive action of the 2022 Olympic Winter Games got underway on Wednesday with four curling mixed doubles games, reported Xinhua.

The Olympic torch relay also started in the day, two days before the Games will officially open in the Chinese capital.

At the Ice cube, China's Fan Suyan and Ling Zhi withstood pressure to upset Switzerland's Olympic silver medalists Jenny Perret and Martin Rios 7-6 after an extra end.

The Chinese duo, having just partnered each other for less than three months and making their Olympic debuts, established a 3-0 lead after the first three ends. However, the Swiss pair turned the table 5-4 after taking three points in the 6th end.

A 6-6 tie saw the match went into extra end where Fan's decisive take-out stone claimed victory for China.

"This is our first match today and the first match for Team China, so we were determined to set off the Winter Olympics to a good start, and concentrated on every delivery with this mindset," said Fan, who was happy to claim the victory on the second day of the Chinese New Year.

Elsewhere, Zuzana Paulova and Tomas Paul of Czech Republic made a surprising comeback tying the game 6-6 in the 8th end and edged their Norwegian counterparts Kristin Skaslien and Magnus Nedregotten 7-6 in the extra.

Vicky Persinger and Christopher Plys of United States defeated Tahli Gill and Dean Hewitt of Australia 6-5, while Jennifer Dodds and Bruce Mouat of Britain stunned Almida De Val and Oskar Eriksson of Sweden 9-5.

"It was a tricky ice out there. We have been different from the practice this morning, so we have to learn the ice," said five-time world champion Eriksson.

Early in the morning, the launch ceremony for the torch relay was held at Beijing's Olympic Forest Park.

Chinese Vice Premier Han Zheng, also a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, lit a torch from a cauldron, then handed it to 80-year-old Luo Zhihuan, China's first winter sports world champion.

The first day of the relay celebrated Beijing as a dual Olympic city as the flame made its way to the Beijing Winter Olympic Park, where an amphibious robot passed on the flame underwater for the first time in Olympic history.

Scaled down due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the three-day torch relay will cover the three competition zones of Beijing 2022 and culminate with the lighting of the cauldron at the opening ceremony on Friday night.