Milano Cortina 2026: Best wheelchair curling moments
Canada take mixed team gold with final throw gamble China’s Jinqiao Yang impresses on mixed doubles debut Latvia win nail-biting mixed doubles bronze medal match 24 Mar 2026
The Milano Cortina 2026 Paralympic Winter Games featured unforgettable moments, groundbreaking achievements, and emotional highs, all taking place at stunning venues in Italy.
Wheelchair curling history was made at the Cortina Curling Olympic Stadium. China won the mixed doubles tournament, while Canada topped the mixed team event for the first time since Sochi 2014.
Best Moments of Wheelchair Curling 🥌 | Milano Cortina 2026❄️🏔️
Here are three moments from wheelchair curling that made the Milano Cortina 2026 Paralympics even more magical.
Top moment: Canada take mixed team gold with final throw gamble
Canada won their first wheelchair curling gold medal in 12 years after a dramatic end to a tense mixed team final against China.
After six stones were landed in the opening seven ends, the match sparked to life in the eighth, when China’s Mingliang Zhang drew to the four-foot and Canada’s Jon Thurston sent his next stone through the house.
China held the single they needed to win until Mark Ideson drew alongside China’s closest stone on his penultimate throw. When Chinese skip Haitao Wang uncharacteristically threw past the house with his last, confusion reigned, with neither team sure whose stone lay closer to the button.
With only three seconds left on his shot clock, Ideson opted to gamble, executing a perfect raise to push his previous rock on the button and secure a 4-3 win.
“It was a huge team effort out there, the four of us on the ice and the seven behind the scenes. Everyone working hard to get us to where we ended up. I’m so happy to have got it finished,” Ideson said, adding that his last shot was a “bit of a gamble”.
Sweden won the bronze medal match against the Republic of Korea 7-4.
Read more about the wheelchair curling mixed team gold medal match
Rising star: China’s Jinqiao Yang impresses on mixed doubles debut
China’s Jinqiao Yang was the youngest athlete in the inaugural wheelchair curling mixed doubles tournament, but the 24-year-old proved age is just a number.
Together with Meng Wang, he won gold after surviving a late scare against Hyejin Baek and Yongsuk Lee of the Republic of Korea in the gold-medal match.
Wang, 37, and Yang have been playing together since the second half of 2023.
“Only now I can actually feel it hanging around my neck. It feels heavy,” Yang said after the Victory Ceremony. “I feel that the efforts of these four years have not been in vain, and it also justifies efforts of the last four years.”
Discover more about Yang and the mixed doubles finallists
Surprise moment: Latvia win nail-biting mixed doubles bronze medal match
Despite beginning with three straight defeats, Latvia’s Polina Rozkova and Agris Lasmans ultimately clinched the bronze medal in the mixed doubles tournament. It was the country’s first-ever medal at a Winter Paralympics.
The bronze-medal match against Laura Dwyer and Stephen Emt of the USA went into extra end. The Latvian pair squeaked out an 11-10 victory, and danced and hugged in celebration.
“It was our goal. Every game was our mini final. If we lost, then we lost everything,” Rozkova said of Latvia’s campaign in Cortina. “Team USA showed a really good performance. And we said, ‘No, no, we are not ready to give up.’”
“We put so much work in, not only this last year or the last three years. It’s 10 years-plus of work.”
Get to know how Polina Rozkova prepared for the Games - and her cat
