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SOCHI, Russia (AP) - Curling fever has gripped Britain _ again.
Ever since Rhona Martin won the gold medal for the British with her so-called "Stone of Destiny" in 2002, the country gets hooked on a sport that is mocked by some and loved by others.
Even more so this year, with Eve Muirhead's women's team winning bronze on Thursday and David Murdoch's men's team advancing to Friday's final against Canada.
Sebastian Coe, one of the country's greatest Olympians and current chairman of the British Olympic Association, describes the scene on Monday as he sat in his car in a traffic jam on the notoriously busy M25 ring road around London.
"We were all stationary and when David Murdoch's stone went in, people were opening their windows, horns were being (beeped) and headlights were being flashed," said Coe, speaking outside the Ice Cube Curling Center after Muirhead won bronze. "It was an extraordinary moment to be witnessing the globalization of curling on the edges of Surrey and Middlesex.
"You felt the globe was wobbling a bit."
_ By Steve Douglas _ Twitter http://twitter.com/sdouglas80
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Associated Press reporters are filing dispatches about happenings in and around Sochi during the 2014 Winter Games. Follow AP journalists covering the Olympics on Twitter: http://apne.ws/1c3WMiu
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