[ed. Amanda will be writing a few articles for BCRN this summer before returning to VIU to continue her studies. She’s also writing articles for BC Grassroots Rugby during their summer schedule. Her first assignment was to write an article introducing herself. You can reach her at whipple@bcrugbynews.com]
Mike Levitt has turned a love of rugby and a skill at writing into a post retirement career. He already has had local media articles published highlighting his books aimed at a youth readership. The Williams Lake Tribune article noted “Retired high school teacher and former Williams Lake rugby coach Mike Levitt has penned his second book about the sport: Rugby Rookies, released this month by Lorimer publishing.” The Kamloops This Week article opened with, “Kamloops author Mike Levitt split the uprights with his first kick at a childrens book.”
We are looking for an individual to assist in the operation of BC Rugby News. The person will be employed by BC Grassroots Rugby and will share duties between organizations, spending at least two days coaching youth with BC Grassroots Rugby. The remaining time will be spent on BCRN activities. These may include the following tasks:
The profiles of the 2020 Inductees are highlighted below in the Rugby Canada media release but we’ll add some notes on those we’ve had the pleasure to meet and sometimes work alongside as part of the BC rugby community.
from Canadian Rugby Foundation
The Board of the Canadian Rugby Foundation is pleased to announce the appointment of Jeff Chan to the role of Foundation Executive Director. Jeff replaces Clay Panga who will continue to assist with the development of the Canada U 20 program and head up the new British Columbia Grassroots Rugby Foundation that is looking to grow the game amongst young children throughout British Columbia.
Jamie Cudmore and James Haskell are at the head of a new lobby group called Progressive Rugby according to this article in the Guardian.
We had a chance to catch up with Canada 7s player Lucas Hammond and talk about his new real estate career while he continues his rugby career with the national 7s team on the road to the Olympics.
An interesting development in the Victoria sports scene. Starlight Investments, out of Toronto, will pay $500K over 5 years to get naming rights to Westhills Stadium. Langford gets 15% of that but the article in the Times Colonist doesn’t specify where the other 85% goes. The article goes onto explain that the deal is big, “for Langford and for Pacific FC”. We’re assuming the bulk of the money is a Pacific FC sponsorship. We’ve reached out to Rugby Canada to see if they benefit at all from the renaming, they are mentioned in the article as one of the main tenants of the stadium along with Pacific FC and the Westshore Rebels football team.
[ed. glad to hear the damage was minimal. Rugby clubs across Canada will be hoping for a spring start to rugby. ]
from Edmonton Clansmen Rugby Club
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/clanrugbyyeg/
Hello Clansmen. For those that are not already aware, the clubhouse experienced a fire in the basement early this morning. The damage is not extensive and is mostly isolated to the men’s change room. Fire investigators have handed off the building to us and we are now awaiting a visit from the insurance investigator which will take place this afternoon.
This is a story worth following, it seems incredible that the JRFU would continue with the match with a full crowd when the government has called a State of Emergency starting Friday. The match is scheduled to kickoff Monday, January 11th, which is a holiday in Japan.
Up to 17,000 may attend national university rugby final next week – from Japan Times