The Alberta five-pin bowling provincials are returning to Grande Prairie once again this week and for HJ’s bowling owner Gerald Hafner, it will be his first time hosting the event.
The passionate Hafner says he looks forward to an elite showing of bowlers from around the province and is both “nervous and excited” for the event.
“It’s our first time hosting for my wife and I since we’ve owned the lanes and what that means is all of Alberta is coming down, and we’re basically taking care of 100 other bowlers coming to town,” he says. “Bowling has been my passion my whole life, so having this here, for us it’s going to be amazing, my wife and I, we’re nervous but excited of course.”
The tournament host venue rotates between five zones- Edmonton, Calgary, Southern Alberta, Central Alberta, and Northern Alberta, and consists of bowlers competing in men’s, women’s, mixed, and singles categories, vying for a shot at nationals in Ottawa.
Hafner says five-pin bowling remains a staple in the city and despite a tough few years due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Hafner says he and his wife have worked hard to establish the sport in Grande Prairie.
“Since my wife and I have taken over, we’ve done well bringing the game back because the sport was dying in Grande Prairie,” he says. “The sport was dying for a long time in our area, with COVID and everything, it was tough but we held on long enough to continue to go again and it took right off again, everybody was supporting us.”
HJ’s five-pin bowling is not new to tournament hosting, and Hafner says plans are in place to provide a good show for both the competitors and spectators alike.
“We’ve held so many tournaments but to me this is the biggest one, when you’ve got the elites coming here you want to present yourself properly,” he says. “We just had a tournament a month ago and it was full, it was exciting, and five-pin bowling is a hard game, so to have the competition that we have coming here, it’s meaningful.”
The tournament begins on March 27th, when the single bowlers hit the lanes, with the rest of the tournament scheduled to continue from March 28th to March 30th.