RUGBY SEVENS ONE OF THE FASTEST GROWING TEAM SPORTS IN CANADA

Based on the Olympic inclusion and success of the HSBC World Rugby Men’s and Women’s Sevens Series, Rugby Sevens is one of the fastest growing team sports in Canada. To keep up with the demand for producing high performance athletes, Rugby Canada has worked with funding partners and provincial unions to build pathway programs in strategic areas of the country.

The Rugby Canada Sevens Academy’s (RCA’s) are a critical piece of the National Senior Women’s Sevens program and age-grade development.  Largely focused in Ontario and led by Sandro Fiorino, over 50 targeted athletes in the province are in regular training sessions.  The main RCA is centered out of the Canadian Sport Centre – Ontario and has a full-time S&C and part-time athletic therapist with the program.  Sandro’s core group has over 24 athletes that practice and train 4-5 days per week in the gym and on-field. 

The remaining athletes are training in RCA hubs across the province. Colette McAuley runs a training group out of Guelph, ON with targeted athletes training out the UofG Fieldhouse. Rugby Ontario and provincial coaches are contributing to the RCAs and both Dan Valley and Jen Boyd run training sessions for university and regionally targeted athletes in Kingston and Ottawa.

The RCA in Quebec has been running for over 4 years and has seen athletes including Pamphinette Buisa, Fabiola Forteza, Arielle Normandin-Leclerc, and Sabrina Poulin transition to the National Senior Women’s Sevens training centre in Victoria, BC. Jocelyn Barrieau leads this Academy out of Montreal with over 15 athletes and regular skills sessions.

These regional centres are important for the athletes learning to train and the training-to-compete level of development.  The opportunity for athletes to have regular training sessions has seen significant development in both skills, conditioning, and sevens understanding when athletes compete internationally and trial with the senior program.

The training groups are supported by regional competitions at the U18 and University level.  This supports player development, enhances the pathway, and creates a better platform for player selection to FISU and the age-grade programs. 

Royal Military College is hosting U18 tournaments across 3 weekends and men’s and women’s and Invitational OUA / RSEQ tournaments:

January 19-21, 2018 (RMC) KINGSTON, ON

February 9-11, 2018 (RMC) KINGSTON, ON         

March 16-18, 2018 (RMC) KINGSTON, ON

The first tournament had 160 athletes competing for their pool championship. Memorial travelled all the way from Newfoundland to be a part of this inaugural event. The top teams in the OUA and RSEQ are committed to competing in this pathway for Rugby Canada to identify athletes and promote the development of 7s athletes.

Rugby Ontario has also used this opportunity to have the top 50 U18 rugby 7s players compete against each other to prepare for their upcoming Nationals. The second of 3 tournaments will be held on Sunday Feb 11 where the OUA Champion and the RSEQ Champion will go head to head in pool play and a CSA best-on-best will be underway with Ontario U18, Quebec U18 and athletes coming in from other provinces to trial for the Youth Olympic Games qualifier in March.

The age-grade competitions have been critical in supporting the depth and development on the women’s side.  From the women’s 2014 Youth Olympic Games (2^nd) and 2015 Youth Commonwealth Games (2^nd) 10 athletes have been carded, 4 have been on a series, and 2 were part of the 2016 Olympic team.  An additional 4 athletes were given carding support from the U18 Europeans last year.

Youth Olympic Games Qualifier

March 2-4, 2018                              LAS VEGAS, USA

*During Las Vegas Series

U18 7s Nationals (Hosted by BC Rugby Union)

March 7-9, 2018 VANCOUVER, BC

U18 7s Sanix World Youth Championship (Women)

April 28-29, 2018 FUKUOKA, JAPAN

Youth Olympic Games

October 1-12, 2018 BUENOS AIRES, ARGENTINA

This is also complemented by the robust CanWest University Sevens, supported by B2ten, that has completed one stop of 4 for the 2018 season:

January 20-21, 2018 (University of Alberta) EDMONTON, AB
February 3-4, 2018 (University of Victoria)VICTORIA, BC
February 17-18, 2018 (Fraser Valley University) FRASER VALLEY, BC
February 24-25, 2018 (University of British Columbia) VANCOUVER, BC
 

Rugby Canada would like to thank Own The Podium for their support.