To get into the Olympic spirit, Sudbury's Finlandia Village is hosting its first Finlandia Summer Olympics event for residents.
With Rio 2016 opening ceremony set to kick off Friday night, Finlandia hosted its own opening ceremony earlier in the day.
Jill Rodgers, assistant director of care for the Finlandia nursing home, sat on the Finladia Summer Olympics Committee, and said residents played a major role in planning the events.
Many residents were part of the committee, and suggested many of the events that will take place at the nursing home and retirement community over the next two weeks.
Those events include horseshoes, balloon badminton, soft ball toss, bocce ball, mini putt and curling.
Rodgers said the events will be a good way to get all residents active.
“We're a huge community with different needs, and sometimes it's hard to co-ordinate everyone all together,” she said.
Friday morning, Finlandia hosted its own torch run relay, where several residents took turns carrying an actual Olympic torch to a homemade Olympic cauldron (using colourful tissue paper to recreate the flame).
Finlandia resident Don Bretzlaff donated his real Olympic torch from the 2010 Vancouver Winter Games.
Bretzlaff was one of several Sudburians who carried the torch through the city that winter before the games started.
In 1960, he made it to the Olympic trials for C1 paddling at the summer games in Rome.
Bretzlaff said carrying the torch in 2010 brought back a lot of memories of his youth, and the years he spent as a competitive paddler.
The Finlandia Summer Games will conclude with a closing ceremony on Aug. 19.
