Olympics Underway in Sochi

  The opening ceremonies aren’t until Friday, but the figure skating competition at the 2014 Olympics in Sochi began on Thursday.
 
  However, the team pairs short program on Thursday will not involve the Virden-based figure skating duo of Paige Lawrence and Rudi Swiegers as Canadian champions Meagan Duhamel and Eric Radford will skate the pairs short program to Canada in the team competition.
 
  That means Lawrence and Swiegers will get to march with their fellow Canadian athletes in the opening ceremonies.
 
  "Everybody that I’ve talked to that has been Olympians, they always talk about that moment walking into the stadium for the first time with the flashes in the crowd going off," said Swiegers in a recent interview with CKLQ, "It’s something that has just resonated deep within me, that’s something I want to go experience and that’s kind of set the goal.  I want to go experience that so that’s something I’m really excited for."
 
  The actual pairs competition for Lawrence and Swiegers will take place on Tuesday and Thursday of next week.
 
  "For us, going into the Olympics, it’s not about medalling," said Lawrence, "We really just want to go skate two personals bests and come home feeling proud and satisfied with our skates there."
 
  There’s also some freestyle skiing take place on Thursday, but most of the other events begin on Saturday, including women’s hockey.
 
  The curling competition begins on Monday.