With Invictus Games currently being held in The Hague, Canadian sports fans were pleased to hear that the event will soon be heading to Vancouver and Whistler. This will happen in 2025, when winter sports will be included in the games for the first time.
More About the Invictus Games
This event was founded by Prince Harry to celebrate the bravery and achievement of sick and wounded military personnel. The name comes from a word in Latin that means undefeated or unconquered, and it reflects the fighting spirit of the participants who take part in the different sports it covers.
The Invictus Games were inspired by the Warrior Games in the US, where Prince Harry saw a similar type of event that has been taking place each year since 2010. As for the Invictus Games, they were launched in 2014 in London and have proved to be a huge success. Florida, Toronto, and Sydney have all hosted different versions of the event, while the 2023 meeting is set for Düsseldorf in Germany.
With global interest in sports becoming ever greater thanks to technology such as live streaming and online betting, the appetite for discovering sporting events like this has grown. If we look at the example of the William Hill sports betting site, we can see a variety of leagues such as the NFL, MLB, and NBA, as well as the NHL. They also include less widely-popular sports such as darts, futsal, and snooker, meaning that finding new sports is now easy to do online.
What About the 2025 Games?
As the Invictus Games in The Hague came to a close, Prince Harry revealed that they will be going to Canada in 2025, with Vancouver and Whistler the destinations. The eight-day event will be held in February 2025 and it’s going to be known as the Winter Hybrid Games.
The reason for this name is that the meeting will include winter adaptive sports for the first time. Nordic skiing, wheelchair curling, and alpine skiing are a few of the winter sports that will be included in 2025. The non-winter sports covered quite a range of activities, from swimming and wheelchair rugby to indoor rowing and wheelchair basketball.
With the games becoming more popular with each new event, it’s thought that more than 500 athletes will take part in the Canadian event, with competitors from over 20 countries due to be there.
It’s worth noting that Canada will be the first country to host these games more than once, since the 2017 event took place in Toronto. The location appears to have been at least partly chosen by Harry and wife Meghan Markle, as they live relatively near in California and the Vancouver area is thought to hold special meaning for them after they took their first family vacation there following the birth of their first child. This event was also where the couple made their first public appearance together.
Nick Booth is the CEO of True Patriot Love, which is a foundation based in Canada that looks after military veterans and their families. He stated that the mixture of sports for 2025 should make it “exciting for the athletes taking part and their families.” This foundation has teamed up the local and provincial governments to host the 2025 games, having done the same for the 2017 version in Toronto.
This might not be the only major sporting event held in Vancouver and Whistler in the next few years. They have already submitted a joint bid, together with local first nations, to hold the upcoming 2030 Winter Games, having previously hosted the 2010 version of this event.
