If skating on thin ice ever becomes an Olympic sport, anyone who has been watching the Venice Cup at these World Championships will know who the gold medal winners are likely to be.

In case you haven’t noticed, the defending Venice Cup champions from Germany have lost nine of 11 matches, albeit mostly by small margins. That accounts for the fact that the team is still very close to a qualifying spot, lying only 9 Victory Points out of eighth place.

Fortunately for the ladies from Deutschland, they don’t need miracles, only a bit more luck and a blitz or two.
The Germans will get some sympathy from Chinese Taipei, the Venice Cup leaders after play on Wednesday. They lost two of three matches on Thursday, one of them a near-blitz, to fall into sixth place.

Also feeling some pain were USAII in the Bermuda Bowl. That team, featuring four players with limited international experience, were sitting pretty in the second spot starting the day. They suffered three big losses, however -- 85-28 to Monaco, 58-15 to Canada and 54-34 to Bulgaria. The Americans dropped from second to sixth with seven matches to play in the round-robin.

Despite losing two close matches, Italy retained their lead in the Bermuda Bowl standings, followed closely by USAI.
With seven rounds to play in the Senior Bowl, USAI were in the lead, taking over from France, who dropped to second but by only 4 VPs. Israel and USAII were close behind. The Senior Bowl concludes on Monday.