Harnessing Hope: How Ontario Curlers Turn Ice into Impact with Over $500,000 and Counting Raised for Cancer Research
Harnessing Hope: How Ontario Curlers Turn Ice into Impact with Over $500,000 and Counting Raised for Cancer Research
By Kerri Lott, Curling Ontario
Walk into the Leaside Curling Club during the Toronto Hope Bonspiel, and you will instantly notice something feels fundamentally different. On Sheet 1, a team in matching pink tutus is lining up a draw. On Sheet 3, a club member in her first season is getting high-fives from a provincial champion. The laughter is louder, the hugs are tighter, and when the bagpipes echoing through the opening ceremonies fall silent, you realize you aren’t just standing in a curling club – you are part of a movement.
Cancer leaves no corner of our curling community untouched. We all know someone: a skip who missed a season for treatment, a front-end partner we lost too soon, or a parent who taught us how to slide. It was that exact shared reality that drove Shawnessy Johnson and a dedicated organizing team back in 2019 to ask a simple question: What if we took the magic of The Bearskin Hope Classic, the iconic 25-year women’s bonspiel in Thunder Bay that raised over $3 million for regional cancer care, and built something like it right here in the GTA?
The result was the Toronto Hope.
What started as a seed of an idea has grown into a powerhouse for good. Since 2023, the Toronto Hope has been hosted at the Leaside Curling Club, bringing curlers from over 20 curling clubs across Ontario together to #curlforgood. To date, this incredible network of women has raised over $500,000 for women’s cancer research and treatment at the Odette Cancer Centre at Sunnybrook Hospital. In addition to the bonspiel fee, every curler must fundraise at least $150 for the Odette Cancer Centre. And there are Fundraising Incentive Prizes to encourage even more fundraising!
The impact of this grassroots movement is as tangible as it gets. In 2023, the Sunnybrook Foundation officially named an Odette Cancer Centre exam room after the Toronto Hope, creating a permanent physical reminder of what curlers can accomplish when we Harness Our Positive Energy.
Behind every dollar raised is a dedicated volunteer team that works year-round planning Toronto Hope Day. The core TO Hope Leadership Team is made up of curlers from six different curling clubs, and event day sees more than 50 TO Hope volunteers help at Leaside Curling Club and the William Lea Room, where participants gather for the Awards Banquet. What remains consistent across the board is the pride in what everyone involved has accomplished. The dedicated volunteers have created a movement that curlers want to be a part of!
“The Toronto Hope is a curling event, not just a bonspiel,” the organizing team shares. “We have an Opening Ceremony with a piper and on-ice team photos, amazing food throughout the day made possible by our corporate sponsors, fun team names and costumes, and a general excitement about being part of something that is bigger than all of us.”
On TO Hope Day, the schedule balances spirited on-ice play with uninhibited celebration. After two five-end SKINS games, players trade their sliders for dancing shoes, moving to a neighbouring venue for the TO Hope Awards Banquet, complete with a live DJ and entertainment that keeps the dance floor packed until 11:00 PM.
It is an atmosphere so magnetic that it draws curling legends, dedicated corporate partners, and both accomplished curlers and people who have never set foot on the ice before.
“One of my absolute favourite memories of the Toronto Hope was having Colleen Jones join us for two of our events,” says Co-Chair Shawnessy Johnson. “Devin Heroux has been such an incredible supporter right from the very beginning, and I know how much he loved being on the ice at the TO Hope alongside Colleen. She championed everything about curling, and I think she was truly blown away by the incredible positivity and energy our community brought to every single end.”
TO Hope registration opens June 1st, and the 32 team spots sell out within two weeks. To keep the spirit of community alive, registration isn’t strictly first-come, first-served: top fundraising teams earn early-bird access, while eight spots are explicitly reserved every single year for brand-new teams to join the TO Hope.
And the vision is only expanding. The team is currently building The Hope Bonspiel Series, a blueprint designed to help curling clubs across Ontario partner with their own local charities of choice, leveraging the Toronto Hope network and model to launch high-impact fundraisers in their own communities. Why just curl when you can #curlforgood?!
As curlers, we often measure our sport in ends, points, and championship banners. But events like the Toronto Hope remind us of what truly lies at the heart of the curling family. It proves that when we step onto the ice together, we aren’t just throwing rocks: we are moving mountains.
How Your Club Can Get Involved
Whether you field a team or support from afar, every dollar helps move research forward:
- Support a Curler or Team: Visit support.sunnybrook.ca/tohope2026 to donate directly to this year’s participants.
- Bring The Hope Model to Your Club: Curling Ontario is excited to collaborate with Toronto Hope to help spread their framework to clubs across the province! Look out for an upcoming virtual session in 2027, where you can learn how your club can participate in The Hope Bonspiel Series or host a mini-fundraiser to #curlforgood.
Visit www.torontohope.ca or follow @tohopecurling to learn more about Toronto Hope.
