Sweeping lynchpin Bobby Lammie says the lingering ‘hurt’ of Beijing curling silver is fuelling his pursuit of climbing one step higher on the Winter Olympic podium.

The Stranraer star, 25, was part of skip Bruce Mouat’s rink who went down to a nerve-shredding 5-4 defeat against Sweden in the final at the Ice Cube.

Mouat, Lammie, Grant Hardie and Hammy McMillan were unable to battle past savvy Swedish skip Niklas Edin as their Beijing adventure came to a gut-wrenching end.

Lammie, renowned for his indefatigable sweeping on the Chinese ice, wasn’t satisfied with silver and wants to use that setback to intensify his pursuit of Milan-Cortina 2026 gold.

“We came so close this time, it hurts quite a bit,” said Lammie, who was speaking at London’s Langham hotel after touching back down from Beijing.

“Especially as we were so close.

“But now we need to re-group, get ready, sort a couple of things out and then just take it to another level.

“We need to try and get ready for four years’ time and go one better and be on top of the podium this time.

“The Olympics was amazing - the whole Olympic environment and the Team GB environment with a multisport event is obviously different from what we’re used to.

“I loved every minute of it. The Chinese organising committee put on an excellent event, the volunteers were so friendly and welcoming, and it just made it even better for us.”

Mouat’s men reeled off eight wins on the spin to top their group before a gutsy win over defending champions USA guaranteed them at least a silver medal.

That set the stage for a mouth-watering Saturday showdown but Sweden, spearheaded by five-time world champion Edin, delivered a stunning display to edge over the line.

Skip Edin, 36, was at his tactical, intelligent best to hold his nerve in the final end and haul his country to a brilliant gold medal.

Britain’s run to the final was the product of four years of hard graft and Lammie, whose team are four of over 1,000 athletes able to train full-time, access to the world’s best coaches and benefit from pioneering technology, science and medical support thanks to vital National Lottery funding, added: “There’s been a lot of hard work, obviously training five days a week, three sessions a day and obviously we’re full-time athletes.

“Many thanks to everyone who plays The National Lottery for allowing us to be full-time athletes and chase these dreams and allow us to put the hard work in, because we can just fully focus on curling and everything that goes on with that.

“So massive thanks to them. There’s been a lot of hard work, so it’s nice that we medalled to show that we’re doing the right things.”

No one does more to support our Olympic and Paralympic athletes than National Lottery players, who raise more than £30 million each week for good causes including grassroots and elite sport. Discover the positive impact playing the National Lottery has at www.lotterygoodcauses.org.uk and get involved by using the hashtag: #TNLAthletes