Evolving Game

20 years since first Canadian Wheelchair Curling Championship

This year marks 20 years since the first Canadian Wheelchair Curling Championship was held in 2004. Three athletes in this year’s national field also competed in the inaugural Canadian Wheelchair Curling Championship: Ontario’s Chris Rees and Ken Gregory, as well as British Columbia’s Gerry Austgarden.  

“It was great!” said Ken Gregory, lead for Ontario #2’s Team Chris Rees. “To be part of the very first nationals, since it was at the grassroots, it was fantastic. You could see the sport growing.” 

The first national event was held at the Toronto Cricket Club and comprised four teams from two provincial hotbeds of wheelchair curling: Ontario and British Columbia. Team Canada was from Ontario, plus there was a second Ontario team with Rees and Gregory, along with two teams from British Columbia. The winners were Team Canada’s Chris Daw, Bruce McAninch, Jim Primavera, and Karen Blachford. In the final, Team Canada defeated Team British Columbia, skipped by Austgarden. 

“It wasn’t quite what it is today, but it was still exciting nonetheless,” recalled Austgarden, who took up wheelchair curling after reading a newspaper article about it becoming a Paralympic sport. “Our team had only been playing for a short time and then were off to the nationals. It was quite a messy game back then. There were guards everywhere!” 

Rees, currently skipping Team Ontario #2, had similar memories about the early days of the game. 

“It’s come a long, long way,” he said. “There were early days where the first one in the house would win the end. The strategies were very basic. Put something in the house and guard it and just hope for the best. It’s not like that anymore.” 

Rees credits his friend Gregory for getting him involved with curling. They were teammates at the 2004 nationals, and today they are teammates again at the 2024 championship in Moose Jaw, Sask. 

“I fell in love with it that first day, and they had to drag me off the ice,” said Rees, who has played in eight national championships. “When I first started, I never thought this would actually be a viable sport for me. But you develop your technique, and you get better at it, and you practise, and you spend those hours in the cold rink in the early morning by yourself concentrating on drills.” 

Wheelchair curling became a Paralympic sport in 2006, and its inclusion in the Paralympic Games program brought a lot more awareness to the sport. The game continues to evolve as competition and training techniques have improved. 

“The bar keeps raising,” said Rees. “People are getting a lot more accurate with their hitting. We’re using timing between the hog lines to use as a sliding scale for when we go to different venues and the ice is different. We never used lasers back then – we’re using lasers now and timing gates.” 

The high level of competition at the national championship appeals to Rees, but so does the camaraderie of the game.  

“This is a high-pressure environment and I love it,” he said. “I’ve played against a lot of these teams multiple times, and there’s a lot of faces that come to these nationals on a regular basis. We all know each other and it’s a big family and we encourage each other. It’s different when we’re on the ice, but when we’re off the ice we’re all friendly.” 

Eleven teams representing eight provinces are competing in the 2024 Canadian Wheelchair Curling Championship. This year marks the 17^th time the championship has been held, with cancellations from 2020 through 2022 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.  

After nine draws of curling, Saskatchewan #1’s Team Gil Dash and Newfoundland & Labrador’s Team Douglas Dean top the leaderboard with 7-1 records. They faced off on Thursday afternoon, with Team Dash winning 9-2 over Team Dean. In the evening draw, Saskatchewan #1’s Team Dash beat Alberta #2’s Team Donald Kuchelyma 8-3 and Newfoundland & Labrador’s Team Dean beat Saskatchewan #2 skipped by Rod Pederson by a score of 10-7.  

In other results Thursday during the 1:30 p.m. draw (all times Central), Team Saskatchewan #1’s Rod Pederson beat Team Ontario #2’s Chris Rees 9-8; Team Ontario #1’s Doug Morris won 7-3 over Team New Brunswick’s Mike Fitzgerald; Team British Columbia’s Gerry Austgarden beat Team Alberta #2’s Donald Kuchelyma 8-7 in an extra end; and Team Manitoba skipped by Dennis Thiessen won 5-4 over Team Alberta #1 skipped by Martin Purvis. 

During the evening draw, Team Ontario #1’s Doug Morris won 9-5 over British Columbia’s rink skipped by Gerry Austgarden; Québec’s Team Carl Marquis won 10-4 over Team New Brunswick’s Mike Fitzgerald; and Team Manitoba’s Dennis Thiessen sits in third place with a 6-2 record after an 11-3 win over Team Ontario #2’s Chris Rees. 

The championship format includes a full 10-game round-robin, with the last two draws being played on Friday at 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. Only the top three teams will make it to the playoffs which will be played on Saturday.  

Day- and full-event passes are available for the 2024 Canadian Wheelchair Curling Championship and can be purchased by CLICKING HERE. 

Select games are available to watch on Curling Canada’s streaming platform Curling Canada+ (https://plus.curling.ca/).  

For scores, team lineups, schedule information and latest news from the championship, visit the event website, www.curling.ca/2024wheelchair.