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To drive home the point, the 2014 B.C. Summer Games will bring out some Island sporting star wattage from the past. Olympic gold- and silver-medallist triathlete Simon Whitfield will help open the Games today and Olympic silver-medallist rower Dave Calder will help close them on Sunday.
Both Whitfield and Calder, looking out for the next generation, are B.C. Games Society board members.
How important have the B.C. Summer Games been as a starting-off point?
Consider that 33 B.C. Games alumni will be competing in the 2014 Commonwealth Games beginning next week in Glasgow, including the likes of Island athletes Sean White and Mike Fuailefau from rugby, Riley McCormick and Emma Friesen from diving and comeback performer Kirsten Sweetland from triathlon. This is after six B.C. Winter Games alumni competed in the Sochi Olympics, including gold-medallist hockey player Jamie Benn from Central Saanich.
They are part of a wider B.C. Summer and Winter Games alumni list that includes Olympic medallists Brent Hayden from swimming, Carol Huynh from wrestling, Carey Price from hockey, Denny Morrison from speed skating, Maelle Ricker from snowboarding, MLB and Canadian national team baseball player Brett Lawrie of the Toronto Blue Jays and Island international cycling and running stars Ryder Hesjedal and Gary Reed.
The whole Games experience comes full arc in the case of Sweetland, the Stelly’s Secondary graduate who won gold at the 2002 B.C. Summer Games, which were also held in Nanaimo.
“A guy like Ryder didn’t just fall out of a tree,” said Kelly Mann of Victoria, in his 15th year as president and CEO of the B.C. Games Society.
“Everyone has to start somewhere. Every PhD had a elementary school teachers who taught him or her the fundamentals.”
This is how you learn the fundamentals of the multi-sport Games system, beginning with the B.C. Games and leading to the Western Canada Games, Canada Games and, for those who make it that far, the Commonwealth/Pan Am Games and Olympics.
“It’s that pathway,” said Mann.
“It’s what B.C. does well [at the introductory Games level].”
There are 454 Island athletes and 79 coaches involved in what will be a home-Island B.C. Summer Games over the next four days, including 196 athletes from Greater Victoria.
They are part of the wave of 2,500 athletes, 500 coaches and 200 officials from across the province descending on Nanaimo this week to take part in 19 sports. More than 2,800 volunteers from the Harbour City are making sure the competitions happen without a hitch.
“We use a transfer-of-knowledge system [from one Games host community to the next],” said Mann.
The last B.C. Summer Games on the Island were in 2002, also in Nanaimo, but the Island will now host back-to-back Summer Games with the Cowichan Valley scheduled to host in 2018. The last B.C. Winter Games on the Island were in 2004 at Port Alberni.
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