How bagpipes helped Muirhead to Olympic gold and leading Team GB

Competing at World Pipe Band Championships helped Eve Muirhead become known as the Ice Queen on her way to Olympic, world and European gold medals in curling, but the Scot is warming to her new role leading Team GB.

The 35-year-old, who retired from competing in 2022, is currently passing on her knowledge and experience as chef de mission for next year's Winter Olympics in Milano Cortina.

Asked on BBC Radio Scotland's The Saturday Show about the title of her new autobiography, Ice Queen, she explains that it goes back to her first Olympics in Vancouver.

"I was only 19 years old and I was skipping a team of other girls that were slightly older than me," she says. "I guess I was kind of thrown in the deep end a little bit.

"We got off to a great start in Vancouver and then the wheels kind of came off. Very quickly the headlines changed.

"All I remember is, when we went out of the tournament, the headline in the paper was 'The Ice Queen has melted' - and I think really from from then it kind of stuck a little bit."

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However, Muirhead viewed it as a learning experience - similar to her time following her father's footsteps into competitive bagpipes, starting with the Vale of Atholl Pipe Band.

"I competed at several world championships," she recalls. "I do actually think, which sounds silly, when everyone asks me how would you perform under pressure, probably some of the most that I learned was in the pipe band when you're marching up to that start line to compete - honestly, you're heart is in your mouth.

"I think going through that so many times, and then also when I competed a lot of it as a solo piper, so it's just you and the judge, like God, you're so, so nervous. I do think even that helped me manage to perform when it came to the big stages and didn't kind of crumble as such under pressure."

Her "Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday practices" became impractical when Muirhead moved to Stirling to start competing at curling, but since then "a lot of people think I have this kind of look that I'm always so kind of fearless."

"I tried to rarely show that I was failing or I was struggling and it got to a stage as well that I couldn't really hide it anymore and that actually was in the lead up to Beijing," she admits.

"So, for me, that's also a kind of highlight of my career - managing to pull through that really, really tough time that I went through to get myself; one, even just out the house; and, two, back on the ice; and, three, managed to get myself to a fourth Olympic Games."

So much so that she left China with a gold medal and a burning desire to "help the next generation" of Scottish and British talent.

'Flip over' from competing 'a real eye-opener'

In November, she announced she was launching the Muirhead Curling Academy, having six months earlier being named Team GB's chef de mission for Milano Cortina.

Muirhead hopes to impart her knowledge of everything from the "really different environment" experienced in the athletes' village to expectations of success bearing down on the athletes.

"I think what we're getting very good at is celebrating all different kinds of wins as well," she says. "Being the chef de mission leading into this Games, I think we need to be very careful and not put all the pressure on the medal hopefuls.

"There's so many athletes that are going there that a top-10 finish for them is a win. So you've got to remember that everyone's at different levels and I guess I could relate that back to me in Vancouver, when you have an outside chance of a medal but finishing top six would have been very good."

Muirhead admits "sometimes I wish I still was an athlete" as she now "more or less has an office job...sitting in front of a laptop".

However, she insists: "Honestly, I absolutely love it. It's been a real eye-opener for me being on the other side of the fence from an athlete.

"I probably was a little bit selfish as an athlete. I maybe didn't give everybody the respect that they needed that helped deliver what they did to make my performance easy or make the platform that I performed on such a smooth sailing journey.

"Flip that over, that's my job now. And I always have that athlete's hat on that I want to create that perfect platform for these athletes to perform at their very best at the Olympic Games.

"In a way as well, I'm in charge of helping deliver those athletes dreams - a dream that they probably had since a young kid, worked very hard for right up until Milano Cortina. It's also great working with all the winter sports and not just curling, so I'm also learning a lot - every day is still a school day for me."

As for those beloved bagpipes, Muirhead adds: "I'm still able to kind of pick them up every now and then and have a tune.

"I seem just to be a kind of cheap gig for friends' weddings and things." At least that comes with "maybe a free meal" and "a free bar".

You can listen to Eve Muirhead, former footballer Ryan Stevenson and writer, comedian and director Kate Hammer on The Saturday Show on BBC Radio Scotland with hosts Amy Irons and Steven Mill from 09:00 GMT until 12:00 on Saturday.