Queens County will play host to another high profile sporting event this fall.<\/p>\n
Curling Canada has announced the Home Hardware Curling Pre-Trials will be held at Queens Place in Liverpool Oct. 26-31.<\/p>\n
Winners of the tournament will advance to the Tim Horton Curling Trials in Saskatoon where teams will compete to represent Canada at the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.<\/p>\n
Liverpool Championship Host Society chair Greg Thorbourne says their record for hosting successful major events paired with a large pool of dedicated volunteers made Liverpool an easy choice to host the event.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you have a good group of volunteers that are willing to step forward then events become easier to put on and reputations travel fast in the community of hosting and they don\u2019t hesitate a lot to give us these events,\u201d said Thorbourne.<\/p>\n
A championship of this size normally requires 150 to 180 volunteers.<\/p>\n
Region of Queens Mayor Darlene Norman says she\u2019s excited to see the region and Queens Place once again being featured on the national stage.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been two years since we\u2019ve really had any large event in there,\u201d said Norman. \u201cSo we\u2019re looking forward to welcome curlers across Canada back to our home again.\u201d<\/p>\n
Thorbourne hopes this event will help bring more business to the local economy.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s concerned if the province doesn\u2019t get to the fifth phase of its reopening plan organizers may not be able to open ticket sales to the public.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo that\u2019s what we\u2019re looking at now is trying to get to Phase 5, hopefully, so that we can sell tickets,\u201d said Thorbourne. \u201cIf we can\u2019t then we will be having an event without any ticket sales.\u201d<\/p>\n
So long as Nova Scotia can reach Phase 5 reopening, Thorbourne is optimistic tickets will sell out even if it doesn\u2019t happen until the end of September.<\/p>\n
Thorbourne says due to the condensed timeline and COVID-19 restrictions the upcoming event is one of the more difficult this group has organized.<\/p>\n
\u201cMost of this stuff should\u2019ve been done six to eight months ago and we\u2019re still in the process of doing it. But we\u2019ll catch up and when it\u2019s all said and done it will be another great event,\u201d said Thorbourne.<\/p>\n
Games will be live streamed throughout the event and the finals will be broadcast on TSN.<\/p>\n
Anyone looking to volunteer can do so through the Liverpool Championship Host Society Facebook<\/a> page.<\/p>\n