Thousands of ringette players are in the city to compete in the Esso Golden Ring ringette tournament this weekend and organizers say 169 teams are expected to take part.
It’s the 33rd year for the annual tournament, which gets underway at arenas across the city on Friday morning.
Ringette was created by Sam Jacks in 1963 and is played on ice with straight sticks and a rubber ring.
The sport continues to grow and 2500 players from across Canada will play in a total of 326 games at this year’s event.
“It’s the biggest in the world,” said Judy Renneberg, Chairperson, 2019 ESSO Golden Ring. “It is a fantastic feeling to walk into any arena in Calgary this weekend and just have ringette, ringette, ringette, instead of being squeezed in between a couple of other hockey games, it’s fantastic.”
Last year, more than 31,000 players across Canada registered to play ringette and Alberta leads the list with more than 6500 registrations.
“We continue to grow in Alberta. It’s one of the provinces that Ringette Canada highlighted as having a lot of growth in the sport in the last few years. And I used to play as a child and the development of the sport and the growth of the sport has been incredible,” said Renneberg.
Two National Ringette League teams, including Calgary RATH, will compete. The team is holding a White-out game at the East Twin Red Arena at 6:15 p.m. on Saturday and will give out white towels to the first 100 fans to arrive.
“We are hosting the Calgary RATH, which is part of the NRL, is playing three games, hosting the Manitoba Intact, two on Saturday and one on Saturday,” said Renneberg.
The Esso Golden Ring ringette tournament runs from January 18th to 20th. Click HERE for more information.
