Player's Own Voice podcast: Canadian curler Lisa Weagle is ready for anything in Beijing

Here's how life works for Lisa Weagle, a curler at the pinnacle of the sport: sometimes she's the lead, and an undisputed force in that capacity, and sometimes she's an alternate, as she happens to be for Jennifer Jones' team at the Beijing Olympics.

For Weagle, there is no difference in the approach or commitment, whichever role she lands.

The fifth member of Jones' powerhouse crew, along with Kaitlyn Lawes, Jocelyne Peterman, and Dawn McEwen, Weagle brings her own mindset regarding previous Olympic experience. She's loving her time in Beijing, but she's also got a healthy perspective on the twists and turns of Olympic fate.

"At the closing ceremony at Pyeongchang, I looked around and noticed how few athletes actually had medals, and I felt like such a failure. But looking around, I was like, 'I don't think they're all failures, so why am I putting that on myself?'"

As for the international competition? Player's Own Voice podcast host Anastasia Bucsis questions the old wisdom among Canadian curlers that it's almost harder to qualify for the Olympics than it is to actually take on the world. Weagle agrees that thinking is becoming less accurate with each passing year. 

In Weagle's view, there is so much talent in curling in Beijing right now they could run the tournament three times and have three different teams wearing the medals after the sheets go quiet.

Control the controllables, as they always say, and meantime, rest assured, the alternate Weagle is ready to throw some of her trademark 'ticks' at a moment's notice.

Like the CBC Sports' Player's Own Voice essay series, POV podcast lets athletes speak to Canadians about issues from a personal perspective.  

A transcript is available for our hard of hearing