Eve Muirhead’s return to curling is the kind of move that immediately changes the conversation around the 2030 Games in France. The Olympic champion has announced she is coming out of retirement to target mixed doubles, with the bigger message being that elite athletes can step away, reset and still come back.
That is no small statement in a sport where rhythm, repetition and timing matter so much. Muirhead won Olympic gold at the Beijing Winter Games in 2022, then retired after that triumph. Four years on, she is back with a very specific aim: the one Olympic medal missing from her collection.
Why Muirhead is back
Muirhead has been open about the fact that she has not been in regular curling competition since retiring. “I haven’t really played at all if I’m honest,” she said. “I’ve played the odd charity event and club game but I wanted and I needed that break.”
That break did not mean stepping away from sport altogether. Since Beijing in 2022, Muirhead has written a book, opened her own curling academy, served as chef de mission at the 2026 Milano-Cortina Games and competed in Hyrox events and ultra-marathons. She also noted that in October she last picked up the bagpipes at her brother’s wedding, which gives a sense of how far her life has moved on since her Olympic title.
Still, the core sporting point is simple. Muirhead believes she is ready to return, and she says the challenge now is getting curling fit again rather than rebuilding her overall conditioning. “I knew it was definitely the right thing to do at the time. I still train very hard, I’m probably the fittest I have ever been. It’s just a case of getting curling fit again,” she said.
Mixed doubles is the target
The key detail is that Muirhead is not returning to the team game. She says this comeback is focused on mixed doubles, the discipline in which she wants to chase the Olympic medal that still eludes her.
That also explains why she stepped away when she did. “When I did retire after Beijing, the option wasn’t there to just do mixed doubles and that was probably one of the reasons why I did hang up my shoes because I felt like, within the team game, I’d kind of accomplished what I wanted to,” she said.
There is a clear competitive logic to that. Muirhead has already won the world championships and Olympic gold in the team format. In mixed doubles, she has been world champion, but not yet Olympic champion. “I won the world championships and got the Olympic gold. But in the mixed doubles, I’ve won the worlds but I haven’t got that ultimate Olympic medal, which I would love to get and that is my ultimate goal,” she said.
Why the comeback matters beyond one athlete
This is more than a personal project. Muirhead also wants the return to have a wider impact, particularly for female athletes weighing up whether a break means the end of an elite career.
“Serena has gone away and had a family, Lindsey Vonn came back from an injury,” she said, using two high-profile examples of sporting return. “I want to show and inspire other female athletes that it is possible to take a break. It’s possible to relocate, to have family and to hold down a different job and come back.”
That message fits the way she describes the challenge ahead. Muirhead says she does not feel she has lost much, but she is realistic about the demands of coming back into a fast-moving environment. “I feel like I’ve not lost any of it and I wouldn’t say it’s quite like riding a bike but I think it’s not going to take long to bring it all back,” she said. “I want to make sure I peak at the right time but it’s a very fast-moving, very competitive environment within British Curling.”
For Muirhead, then, this is both a sporting comeback and a statement of intent. The 2030 Games in France give her a fresh goal, a different discipline and one last big target. After four years away from regular curling, she is back chasing the medal she still wants most.
