Folk in the hamlet of Collessie have a special reason to be looking forward to the Winter Olympics.

One of their neighbours will be among the 52 Team GB competitors hoping to take home a gold medal.

Pete Smith (45), of Collessie, is on the five-strong men's curling team for the Vancouver games.

The event begins on Friday and father-of-three Pete, who is an area manager for a fertiliser company, flew out to Canada last Wednesday to prepare with the squad.

Back home, his fellow villagers are rooting for him while wife Laura and children, Pollyanna (8), Toby (7) and Monty (2), are getting ready to join him in Vancouver.

During a break from training at the British Olympic Association's preparation camp in Calgary, Pete, a member of St Martin's Curling Club, told The Courier that the British men's curling team had every chance of success if it plays to its full potential.

He said, "We are going to do the best we can and if that results in a medal, great.

"We are the current world champions and we have beaten the Canadian team a few times recently."

Canada and Norway are, Pete reckons, the toughest competition out of the 10 nations fielding a men's team.

Pete, who has been curling since the age of 14, is a four-times world champion and was a member of the men's team which won the world title last year.

This is his debut in the Winter Olympics, although he took part in the 1988 Calgary games when curling was still a demonstration sport.

Two of his team-mates, skip David Murdoch and Ewan MacDonald, were in the team which came fourth in the last Winter Olympics in Turin in 2006.

He will travel to Vancouver on Thursday, the day before the opening ceremony, and his first match, against Sweden, will be next Tuesday.

Now, however, Pete and the team are concentrated on maintaining their game, spending on average an hour and a half to two hours on the ice each day and an hour and a half in the gym.

He said, "All the hard work was done before we left. We have been training for the last year.

"We have prepared fairly well."

Next week Laura and the children will be rink-side supporting Pete in Vancouver.

Laura said, "For the kids to go out and watch their dad playing in the Olympics will be great.

"We are all really looking forward to it."

Fellow villagers will be eagerly following Pete's progress.

Collessie Community Council secretary Stuart Mackenzie said, "We are all quite excited about it and we hope he does well. We will all be watching."