With fall comes more than a change in leaves, it also brings on a new crowd of sports fans.
Ottawa is home to a number of high-level teams that play football, soccer, hockey and curling. Although, only one of these sports is based in Centretown: curling.
The other three need to be played in big stadiums such as the Canadian Tire Centre in Kanata and the Glebe’s TD Place. It’s these places that gather the most sports fans.
Even though curling does not have as big of a following as the sports that are played at those venues, it is growing in popularity.
The fact that curling can be held in smaller venues has made it especially popular in Centretown but it too is going to be moving out – at least temporarily.
TD Place will host the Tim Hortons Brier, the nation’s premier men’s curling event, in March, taking away fans from the community’s already small sports base.
Since there is no big stadium in Centretown to house them, there is unfortunately not much that can be done about it.
With two major clubs in town, curling is the community’s principal sport. The Ottawa Curling Club is at 440 O’Connor St. and the Rideau Curling Club is at 715 Cooper St.
Curling has become more popular in the past decade and a half –– and not just in Centretown.
Played unofficially in the Winter Olympics in the 1920s and 1930s, it was brought back as an official sport in the 1998 Winter Olympics. During which both Canada’s men’s and women’s teams won gold medals.
Three years later in 2001, the introduction of an event, Canadian Open: The Grand Slam of Curling, awakened a new generation of fans.
The proof is in the number of viewers who tuned in to CBC to watch the men’s Grand Slam final last year – more than 410,000 people watched.
Locally, the curling community is growing as well.
The Ottawa Curling Club, which hosts many events throughout curling season, has seen a steady increase in membership. When the club was established in 1851, it only had 14 members. Now, there are around 500 members.
While the Tim Hortons Brier will spark even more interest in curling in Ottawa, that interest will not be contained in Centretown.
Since the men’s championship will be hosted in TD Place, it will be likely stealing some of the attention away from Centretown.
The Ottawa Curling Club’s season started late September and a representative of the club told Centretown News it’s too early to tell if the club will have any ties to the Brier. But a representative of the Rideau Curling Club says more people have come in to the club interested in the sport since the Brier was announced.
There may be no way to keep curling fans within Centretown during the Brier but the shift in location is only temporarily. After the Brier the crowds will be returning to Centertown and the Ottawa Curling Club will continue to host local tournaments bringing regaining curler’s attention.