By Mark Staniforth, PA Sport, Salt Lake City

Great Britain's golden curlers allowed themselves only a single glass of champagne to toast their extraordinary Olympic title, because they still have plenty of work to do.

Four months of toil in preparation for their stunning success on the Ogden Ice Sheet is not quite over yet for Rhona Martin's team.

A week on Tuesday they must raise themselves again for the final round of the Scottish Championships in Glasgow.

Martin, Debbie Knox, Janice Rankin and Fiona MacDonald lead the standings at the moment, and they need victory to qualify for the World Championships in Bismarck, North Dakota in April.

Only after Glasgow will MacDonald, Rankin and Knox return to their day jobs, and Martin to her home in the small Ayrshire village of Dunlop to look after her two children, nine-year-old Jennifer and Andrew, six.

"I don't think my children have any idea of what we've achieved," Martin admitted. "To them we're just a wee curling team.

"Having seen it on the telly they will know it's probably a big competition, but they won't appreciate what an Olympic gold medal is."

Even after four months of living in each others' pockets, revolving rooms so each team member shared with each other, Martin's side do not seem particularly anxious to go their separate ways.

Over that period of time they forged a close bond which carried them through a rocky preliminary procedure, two play-offs, a semi-final and a final, totalling 13 games.

"It's been such a long time and of course there have been ups and downs," Martin said. "Everybody's got different temperaments but we just worked through it and we got on well.

"We just got on with the job in hand and dealt with problems when they arose. It was a long concentration span, but it all went really smoothly."

Their longest time apart was when Martin was taken ill with a severe stomach upset during the team's holding camp in Calgary and flown down to Salt Lake City for attention from the British Olympic Association's medical team.

"It happened probably 10 days before the Games," said Martin. "It was hard for the girls because we were in Calgary to practice as a team and I had to leave them there.

"It was hard to deal with. I was worried I would not be fit to play, and it has not completely cleared up yet."

Martin was also worried about a pre-Games knee injury. But she battled through the pain barrier and now, as well as for Glasgow, her team must prepare for their life of fame.

Martin has already insisted that the gold medal will not change her quiet life as a housewife, but the offers will pour in.

Nearly six million people watched their success on British television and there is already talk of the sport capitalising on its popularity and spreading itself into England, where there is currently not a single curling rink.

The British team's performance director Mike Hay said: "This is a fantastic opportunity in the wake of Rhona winning gold for the ladies' team.

"It is a huge success for our game. We lose an awful lot of players when they get jobs down south, and if we got the facilities down south the sport would be guaranteed to grow.

"It has been exposed on British television now rather than just Scottish television. There are already plans to build up to seven rinks in England."