Para sport notebook: Canada wins four of six games at international wheelchair curling tournament

Photo (Curling Canada)

PRAGUE – In a very tightly contested tournament, Canada won four of six games and took fifth spot this past weekend at the nine-team International Wheelchair Curling Tournament 2025.

Canada was represented by its recently nominated Paralympic Games team comprised of skip Mark Ideson of London, Ont., Gil Dash of Kipling, Sask., Ina Forrest of Spallumcheen, B.C., Jon Thurston of Dunsford, Ont. and Collinda Joseph of Ottawa.

All five teams in Canada’s pool went 2-2 in the preliminary round but when the tie breaking procedure was sorted Canada was on the outside ranking third and missed a berth in the semifinals by one spot.

“The first two games stood out because the rocks were a bit tricky to work with,” said Forrest. “You start getting in your head thinking, oh boy, we need a lot of practice, but then the ice improved. I had better rocks to work with, so it felt better as we went on.”

In the prelims, Canada opened with an 11-5 win over Latvia, lost 6-5 to Slovakia 1, fell to Sweden 4-2 then beat Italy 8-2. In the consolation semis, the Canadians beat Sweden 5-2 and took down Latvia 11-3 in the fifth-place game. 

Slovakia 1 took the gold, Great Britain the silver and Italy the bronze while Norway was fourth.

“This was a good opportunity for us to meet up with a lot of teams, and now we can go back and practice so we’re ready for the Paralympics,” said Forrest. “I don’t think we’re feeling the pressure quite yet. We’ve had a lot of competitions at the start of the season, so I think going forward we just have to go back and make sure all our technicals are in perfect order.”

Canada also beat Czechia in a friendly 5-2 before the tournament started.

On the road to Milano Cortina, Team Canada has an upcoming December training camp in Toronto, the Leduc (Alta.) Mixed Event in January, and one final training camp at the beginning of February before a staging camp in Italy, a few weeks later.

National champions crowned in boccia.

The Canadian boccia championships concluded on Sunday at the RA Centre in Ottawa.

The winners were 17-year-old Joe Philpott of St. John’s N.L., in BC1, two-time Paralympian Danik Allard of Bois-des-Filion, Que., with a seventh career title in BC2, Alexandre Lemaire of Kingsey Falls, Que., who reclaimed the BC3 crown, three-time Paralympian Marco Dispaltro of St-Jerome, Que., in BC4 and Mildred Thomas of B.C., in BC5.

It should be noted as well that Philpott defeated Hani Mawji of Burnaby, B.C., in his final. Mawji, a 57-year-old 2008 Paralympian, has competed at all 31 Canadian Boccia Championships.

In pairs competition, Ontario took the BC3 crown and Quebec was first in both the BC 1-2 and the BC4-5-Open categories.

Para ice hockey superpowers gather at international tournament at Dawson Creek, B.C.

An exciting Paralympic Winter Games preview is set to take place at the week-long 2025 Para Hockey Cup which gets underway Sunday (November 30) in Dawson Creek, B.C.

The top four nations in the world will battle for gold. The reigning world and Paralympic champions USA, 2024 world champions Canada, China, bronze medallists at the 2022 Games and Czechia, bronze medallists at the last three world championships.

The Canadians open the preliminary round against China on November 30, face Czechia December 1 and the U.S.  December 3. The semifinals are December 5 and the medal matches December 6.

Here is the full schedule.

Hockey Canada unveiled the 18 players who will wear the Maple Leaf last week. All 18 players won a silver medal at the 2025 International Para Hockey Cup in October, while 16 won a gold medal at the 2024 World Para Hockey Championship in Calgary (Armstrong, Boily, Burnett, Cozzolino, Dixon, Dunn, Halbert, Henry, Hickey, Jacobs-Webb, Kingsmill, Kovacevich, Lavin, Lelièvre, McGregor, Watson).

“This is a key milestone in our preparation for the 2026 Paralympic Winter Games,” said Canada’s head coach Boris Rybalka.

TSN and RDS, the official broadcast partners of Hockey Canada, will broadcast the medal games on Dec. 6. All preliminary round games and both semifinals will be livestreamed at HNLive.ca.

The Canadians are currently hosting a training camp at WinSport Arena at Canada Olympic Park in Calgary, that runs until Wednesday.