2017 Invictus Games In Canada To Include Golf For The First Time

England's Prince Harry Had A Vision For An Expanded International Games For Ill And Injured War Veterans. This Year It's Taking Place In Canada For The First Time And Includes Golf - Image Courtesy Invictus Games/Wikimedia Commons

Courtesy Invictus Games 2017.com

The Invictus Games Toronto 2017, September 23rd - 30th, will feature a dozen adaptive sports, including archery, athletics, indoor rowing, powerlifting, cycling, sitting volleyball, swimming, wheelchair basketball, wheelchair tennis and wheelchair rugby.

Also, new to the sports lineup will be the addition of golf. All competitions will take place in state-of-the-art venues throughout Toronto. 

Hosting the Games in Canada in 2017, the year the country celebrates the 150th anniversary of its Confederation, will provide a unique opportunity for Canadians to commemorate and honour its ill, wounded and injured soldiers, and their families.

Following a visit in 2013 to the US-based Warrior Games for wounded, ill and injured military personnel and veterans, England's Prince Harry was inspired to create an expanded international version. The inaugural Invictus Games took place in London in the fall of 2014 and attracted more than 400 competitors from 13 nations.

The second Invictus Games took place in May 2016 in Orlando, Florida, and built on the excitement of the London Games with more than 500 competitors from 14 nations. The Invictus Games demonstrate soldiers’ and veterans’ indefatigable drive to overcome and the power of sport on their journey to recovery.

Transforming Empathy Into Empowerment

Canadians have a powerful feeling of empathy for soldiers, veterans and their families. They recognize that service members experience a wide range of physical and psychological challenges when serving and after they have left the military. The empathy, however, is often latent; there is little opportunity to show support for active duty and veteran service members and their families as the military experience, for most Canadians, is far removed from their day-to-day existence. When Canadians are reminded of the sacrifice of its military members—often as a result of tragedy, such as the death of a soldier—they respond with an outpouring of support. The Invictus Games Toronto 2017 will provide an opportunity to awaken the latent empathy that Canadians feel for its military and transform it by empowering the Canadian public, politicians and corporations to solicit long-term advocacy, donations and support for the country’s service members and military families in need.

                                              -  www.invictusgames2017.com/why-canada/

‘I AM‘ is the motto for the Invictus Games, inspired by the final two lines of the poem Invictus, penned by English poet William Ernest Henley. Invictus is Latin for unconquered.

The speaker in the poem proclaims his strength in the face of adversity. I AM reflects and defines the Games’ core purpose: to provide a platform for personal achievement, to compete, not just against each other, but against oneself and prove that “I AM the master of my fate, I AM the captain of my soul.”

Invictus, by William Ernest Henley

Out of the night that covers me,

Black as the pit from pole to pole,

I thank whatever gods may be

For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance

I have not winced nor cried aloud.

Under the bludgeonings of chanceMy head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears

Looms but the Horror of the shade,

And yet the menace of the years

Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,

How charged with punishments the scroll,

I am the master of my fate,

I am the captain of my soul.

For more information on the Invictus Games please CLICK HERE.