Sports

Sports in Canada

Yes, it’s true – few sports in Canada are more popular than ice hockey.

Take, for example, in February 2002 when close to six million Canadians watched Canada’s Olympic women’s hockey team win gold in Salt Lake City, Utah. A few days later, Canada turned on their sets again to cheer on the men’s hockey team when they won gold.

But Canadian sport is a lot more than hockey at both the professional and amateur level whether we’re talking about extreme sports or games that take advantage of the great outdoors.

Canadian athletes have become champions in sports ranging from race-car driving to speed skating. World-renowned race-car drivers Gilles and Jacques Villeneuve, speed skater Catriona Le May Doan and golfer Mike Weir are among the many Canadians famous in the world of sports.

Millions of Canadians might not call themselves athletes, but they enjoy everything from swinging a bat to casting a line. Take, for example, the thousands of men and women who cut holes in a frozen river at Ste-Anne-de-la-Pérade every year to fish for tommy cod.

Sporting activities in Canada may be traced to a variety of sources  – curling was imported by Scottish immigrants and Aboriginal peoples introduced canoeing, kayaking, snowshoeing, tobogganing, as well as lacrosse the other national sport of Canada. Today, many Native people play professionally in the National Lacrosse League. 

This section is about sports in Canada.