‘Difficult day’ for top curlers

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This article was published 12/03/2020 (2218 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A last-minute move to pull the plug on the 2020 Women’s Curling Championship, as well as three national curling tournaments, came on “a difficult day” that led to the right decision, Canadian curling’s top executive said.  

On Thursday, with sports leagues suspending play and pressure from health authorities to limit large gatherings mounting, the World Curling Federation cancelled the 2020 women’s worlds, which were set to begin Saturday in Prince George, B.C. 

Hours later, Curling Canada announced three national championships slated for Portage la Prairie next week, in mixed doubles, senior and wheelchair curling, would be “postponed indefinitely.” The move did not impact the already-underway U SPORTS championship, which will wrap up in Portage on Sunday. 

“These are not decisions that we made easily,” Curling Canada CEO Katherine Henderson said in a conference call with reporters. “There were a lot of moving parts up until today… what I want to say is I’m absolutely confident that, with our partners at the WCF, the right decisions have been made.” 

The decision to cancel the women’s worlds came as all 13 teams were already in Prince George. Only one day before, the WCF had still been communicating to teams that they would go ahead with the event. Meetings with health officials on Thursday changed that picture. 

“Up until last night, (B.C. agency) Northern Health was talking about it being very low risk, and suddenly it started moving to very high risk,” Henderson said. “There is quite a bit of anxiety in the community. We realize right now, with the rising rates of infection, we wanted to take as little risk as possible.” 

Officials did have extensive discussions about other risk-mitigation strategies, Henderson said, such as playing without fans in the stands. Concerns about a rapidly shifting travel landscape, as well as media, volunteers and other people convening on the site nixed those ideas. 

“When we started to realize what was happening around the world we realized there’s just too many people we’d potentially be putting at risk,” Henderson said. 

The move naturally comes with some heartbreak for teams. In a statement posted to social media, Kerri Einarson, the skip of the Manitoba and Canadian championship team, said they were “extremely disappointed” by the cancellation, but added that they respect the decision was made in the interests of safety. 

“While we were really looking forward to wearing the Maple Leaf in Canada, our thoughts go out to those affected by the virus,” the statement read. “Our thanks go to all those who have supported Team Canada/Einarson and the event.” 

It’s too soon to say whether the three postponed Canadian championships, which were set to draw the likes of athletes including Jennifer Jones, Brendan Bottcher and Rachel Homan, will be held sometime down the road. 

“We’re assessing the situation minute by minute,” Henderson said. “All I can give you is a definite ‘I don’t know.’ We just don’t have enough information and we don’t see where this whole pandemic is going.” 

As of Thursday afternoon, the WCF had not made a final decision on the status of the men’s world championship, which is scheduled to start in Glasgow, Scotland on March 28. It seems highly unlikely that it will go on as planned: on Thursday, Scotland announced it was banning gatherings of over 500 people. 

melissa.martin@freepress.mb.ca