A Victoria group believes the city is ideally suited to host the Invictus Games and is in Toronto exploring that possibility.
The 2017 Invictus Games, a sporting event for wounded soldiers, began Saturday in Toronto.
“We have the trifecta in Victoria: We have a sports-hosting legacy, we are a military town, and we have a large volunteer base,” said Victoria lawyer Peter Lawless, head coach of the Canadian team.
“If we put them together, we make magic. The drive from 1994 [Commonwealth Games] is still there.”
But there is no guarantee this movement will continue past the next scheduled Invictus Games in 2018 at Sydney, Australia. Prince Harry, who spearheaded the Games’ creation, originally envisioned it as a one-time event in London in 2014. However, momentum carried over into a second Invictus Games at Orlando, Florida, in 2016, and now into Toronto.
“We will have conversations with people here in Toronto as to why these Games should keep going, and we can make a compelling case, because this is actually changing lives,” Lawless said.
About 550 competitors from 17 countries are taking part in the event, which aims to help the war wounded, many grievously, with their recovery.
The Games got off to a rollicking start Saturday as scores of war-wounded athletes marched, limped or wheeled their way to thumping martial music, dazzling lights and supportive cheers into a Toronto sports arena, where they heard Prince Harry praise them for the courage that had brought them to the event.
Harry, who served in Afghanistan with the British army for about two months, said he wanted to use his platform “to help the world understand and be inspired by the spirit of those who wear the uniform.”
“In a world where so many have reasons to feel cynical and apathetic, I wanted to find a way for veterans to be a beacon of light and show us that we all have a role to play — that we all win when we respect our friends, neighbours and communities,” he said. “That’s why we created Invictus — not only to help veterans recover from their physical and mental wounds, but also to inspire people to follow their example of resilience, optimism and service in their own lives.”
Lawless, who has guided several Canadian athletes to medals at the Paralympics and is also vice-president of the Canadian Olympic Committee will be joined in Toronto this coming week by Robert Bettauer, CEO of the Pacific Institute for Sport Excellence, and Lisa Hill, senior vice-president of Raymond James and a local runner and cyclist, as the three make up the Victoria fact-finding group.
“These are a manageable-sized Games, without massive budgets, and with a lot of goodwill associated with helping wounded soldiers,” Bettauer said.
“There is a powerful, emotional element to these Games. At this point, we are just exploring and gathering information.”
Lawless said the budget for the Toronto Invictus Games is between $50 million and $60 million and he envisions a combination of public and private funding if a Victoria Games were to go ahead.
The Invictus Games are a modest event compared to other Games. The 2015 Toronto Pan Am Games, with all associated and ancillary costs, came in at an estimated $2.5 billion. The proposed budget in a 2022 Victoria Commonwealth Games bid was $955 million.
The B.C. government said it could not support the Commonwealth Games bid, which required a $400-million commitment from the province.
“Regardless of the politics of wars, or people’s feelings about those wars, we all owe the Canadian soldiers,” Lawless said.
“The pain and injury, both physical and mental, doesn’t go away. This is a way to help address it and shine a light on it through sport. This is not the endpoint in their physical and mental battles back from injury, but an important milestone.”
— With a file from The Canadian Press
