Kamloops Hosts The 2013 Senior Summer Games

The wait is over for senior-aged athletes in and around the Kamloops region as Kamloops was named host city for the 2013 B.C. Seniors Games.

The announcement was made official at a press conference Nov. 29.

While they were successful the biding process is extremely complex and competitive for all Cities or Towns wishing to host them.

The games bring around 4,000 Athlete’s and Visitors to the City, which could have an overall economic impact of (around) $2 million dollars ingested in the area.

This is an outside guest as what they are projecting. Kamloops hosted the Canada Summer Games in the 90ties and the City was “Buzzing” with excitement and they had an exceptional group of volunteers which made it even more stupendous.

They will take place August 20^th to 24^th in and around the City, known as the Tournament Capital of BC.

His Worship; Mayor Peter Milobar  spoke about the bidding process and stated “We have had our eye on this (for a while) but we had to work through some of the other bids first.”

He continued “Once we landed (the 2011 Western Canada Summer Games) we went after the 2015 Canada Winter Games.

Once we had a decision on that, we seriously started going after the (BC) Seniors Games. “Prince George edged Kamloops and Kelowna to win the bid for the hosting of the 2015 Canada Winter Games.

The area has been working on getting these since 2007, but timing is everything as we all know.

Sean Smith is the co-ordinator for the City and is ecstatic that they were chosen for such a prestigious event. Smith stated “It was nice to see it finally come to fruition.”

Their proposal was recently green-lighted by June Parsons, president of the B.C. Seniors Milobar dropped the odd hint that there will be more announcements pertaining to sporting events coming to Kamloops in the near future. “We’re working on some single-sport national-type events,” he said.
Early in 2013 a board of directors will be selected, then they (the board) will confirm which sports and venues will be a part of the 2013 BCSG.

Aminimum of 24 events and a maximum of 29 will be featured in the River City, according Parsons.

A total of 26 events were held at the 2012 BCSG in Burnaby which included the following;

Archery, badminton, bocce, bridge, carpet bowling, cribbage, cycling, darts, dragon boat racing, five-pin bowling, floor curling, golf, horseshoes, ice curling, ice hockey, lawn bowling, one-act plays, pickleball, slo-pitch, snooker, soccer, swimming, table tennis, tennis, track and field and whist.

The City of Langley will host the 2014 BCSG.

Should be fun, so plan on attending!!