MONCTON, N.B. April 6, 2009 — Norway's Thomas Ulsrud didn't pick up any style points Monday morning at the Moncton Coliseum, but he did pick up a win at the 2009 Ford world men's curling championship.

Ulsrud's Oslo foursome — third Torger Nergard, second Christoffer Svae and lead Havard Vad Petersson — eked out a 7-5 win over John Shuster of the United States in Draw 6 play to move into sole possession of first place in the 12-team round-robin standings with a 4-0 record.
But it wasn't exactly pretty, said Ulsrud, who didn't need to throw his last shot in the 10th when Shuster's final rock picked and wrecked on a guard.

"I think the U.S. played well, and we were not sharp today," said Ulsrud. "We gave away some easy points and we had a little trouble with draw weight. I have to give credit to the icemaker (Hans Wuthrich), it was beautiful ice out there today and we actually handled it badly. We managed to win it. Hey, they don't give any grades for how you look out there. As long as you win."

Scotland's David Murdoch, meanwhile, won his third in succession, dropping a 7-2 beating on Finland's Kalle Kiiskinen. The Scots took control of the game by scoring single points in the fourth, fifth and sixth ends, and the gloves came off after Scotland stole two more in the eighth. Finland dropped to 1-3 with the loss.

Germany's Andy Kapp evened his record at 2-2 with a 9-8 extra-end win over Jiri Snitil of the Czech Republic. Kapp needed to draw the four-foot with his final rock to improve to 2-2, while the Czechs dropped to 1-3.

In the other morning game, Switzerland's Ralph Stoeckli scored five unanswered points to close out the game and beat Ulrik Schmidt of Denmark 9-6. The Danes, 1-3, led 6-4 through six ends but Switzerland scored three in the seventh and closed out with stolen points in the ninth and 10th ends to improve to 2-2

Canada's Kevin Martin (3-0), France's Thomas Dufour (2-1), Japan's Yusuke Morozumi (1-2) and China's Fengchun Wang (0-3) all had byes in the morning draw.

Play at the Ford Worlds continues on Monday with draws scheduled 2 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. (all times Eastern). TSN is televising the Canadian games (2 p.m. against the Czechs, 6:30 against Germany), while coverage also is available at curltv.com.