Winter Olympics watch: Who's up and who's down after the first big weekend

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With the Beijing Games just over a hundred days out and several winter Olympic sports seasons opening in the last few days, it's a great time to start tracking the athletes hoping to win medals in February. So, every Monday in this newsletter, we're going to highlight the most interesting performances from the weekend by Canadian and international winter Olympic hopefuls. This should help you get to know some of the top athletes and follow whose stock is pointing up or down on the road to Beijing. Here's the first edition:

Up: Bruce Mouat

Who's the best men's curler in the world? Is it reigning Brier champion Brendan Bottcher? Four-time Brier winner Kevin Koe? Maybe one of the Brads — Gushue or Jacobs, both former Olympic gold medallists? You can make a strong argument for any of those four Canadian skips. But the numbers say it's Bruce Mouat. According to a ratings model devised by Ken Pomeroy (the statistician best known for his groundbreaking work with college basketball), the 27-year-old Scotsman's team is the top men's rink in the world. Mouat's squad has a slight edge over Gushue's and Jacobs' in Pomeroy's ratings after beating the latter in the final of the first Grand Slam of Curling event of the season (the Masters in Oakville, Ont.) yesterday. Mouat took silver at this year's world championship, losing to Scotland's Nik Edin in the final, and was the bronze medallist in 2018. Dating back to last season, he's now won three consecutive Grand Slam tournaments.

Up: Tracy Fleury

Speaking of underrated skips, Fleury repeated as women's Masters champion yesterday by defeating six-time Scotties winner Jennifer Jones in the final. The 35-year-old from Manitoba has made four Scotties appearances without reaching a final. But Pomeroy's model has her rated No. 4 in the world, behind Switzerland's Silvana Tirinzoni (winner of the last two world championships) and Canada's Rachel Homan and Kerri Einarson, who met in the last two Scotties finals (Einarson won them both). Most people figure it'll be Einarson and Homan battling again in the final of the Canadian Olympic trials in late November (with Jones maybe crashing the party), but Fleury is a potential spoiler to watch. Read more about the women's and men's finals at the Masters and watch highlights here.

Down: Nathan Chen

After finishing a disastrous fifth at the 2018 Olympics, the American quad king won an incredible 14 consecutive men's figure skating competitions — a streak spanning 31 months and featuring three straight world titles. But Chen finally busted on Saturday night in Las Vegas, finishing third at the Grand Prix season opener, Skate America. Vincent Zhou took gold, boosting the United States' hopes of taking two men's podium spots in Beijing. The lone Canadian in the men's competition, Nam Nguyen, finished eighth. Canada came away from Skate America with one medal — a bronze by Laurence Fournier Beaudry and Nikolaj Sorensen in the ice dance event. A more robust roster of Canadians will compete at this week's Grand Prix stop, Skate Canada International, which begins Friday in Vancouver. For more on the big takeaways from Skate America, watch the latest episode of That Figure Skating Show below.

Down: Kim Boutin

The triple short track medallist (and Canada's closing ceremony flag-bearer) from the Pyeongchang Olympics had a rough start to the World Cup season. Boutin placed fifth in the women's 1,500-metre final and failed to make it to the medal round in the 1,000m at this weekend's meet, which was held on the same ice where the Beijing Olympic races will take place. It wasn't all bad news for Canada, though. Courtney Sarault took silver in the women's 1,500, and Pascal Dion grabbed bronze in the men's 1,000.

Up: Canadian big air skiers

The event will make its Olympic debut in Beijing (big air snowboarding was included in Pyeongchang, but not skiing) and two Canadians won medals at the World Cup season opener in Switzerland. Elena Gaskell took bronze in the women's event, while Teal Harle got silver in the men's. Snowboard big air events were also held at the same venue, and Canada's Jasmine Baird grabbed bronze in the women's. Read more about that and watch highlights here.

Up: The Canadian women's hockey team

The first of nine Olympic warmup games between archrivals Canada and the U.S. took place Friday night in Pennsylvania, and the Canadians came away with a 3-1 win. They'll face off again tonight in Hartford, then meet for two games in Ontario in late November. Canada took back the world title in August, beating the U.S. 3-2 in overtime of the gold-medal game in Calgary. But the Americans are the reigning Olympic champs by virtue of their shootout victory in Pyeongchang.