'A gentleman's sport': Young Sask. lawn bowler looking for National medal on home turf

Brandon Watson gave lawn bowling a try after seeing an ad in the school newspaper. Eleven years later he's competing in nationals on home turf.

The Regina Lawn Bowling Club is hosting the Canadian National Championships from August 23 to 29. The tournament is open to all ages.

Regina's Watson is competing in doubles with his brother. The 22-year-old started when he was around 11 and his brother was around 8.

"As I started getting more serious into it," Watson said, "the sport was taking me to all sorts of different places across the country."

Only six days ago Watson took fourth at the U25 National Championships in Winnipeg.

The goal in lawn bowling is to roll balls toward a smaller white ball called the jack. Scoring is similar to curling, with the closest rolls earning points.

"Anyone who likes curling would probably feel at home on a lawn bowling green," Watson said.

Watson, his brother and his cousin were the youngest players when they took the game up.

"We've had more juniors coming out since then," he said. "We see lots [of younger players] on board especially at the national level."

He said it was a challenge being a young bowler.

"Nobody really knew what to expect from the juniors," he said. "This is a gentleman's sport so there's a certain level of expectation as far as how you're supposed to act."

"[Now] a lot of people here, they've really gotten their eyes opened by the juniors and they're always happy to see them around," Watson said.

"The young people they're coming in with fresh ideas and they're looking at things a little bit differently," Watson said. "They're trying to grow the sport getting more young people in."

He said the nice part about the sport is people can play it all their lives.

Watson's mom Janet recently look up the sport as well. She said she doesn't like watching when go head-to-head in competitions.

"I love it especially when the boys are playing together," Janet Watson said. "I'm so proud, it's just a joy to watch them."

In the future, Brandon Watson hopes to compete internationally.

"There's a US open — the Australian Open would be great," Watson said. "My brother, my cousin and myself actually made it to represent Team Canada at the North American Challenge coming up in October here so we're really looking forward to that."

"It's wonderful, the sights that I've seen around Canada, lots of places I would probably not have gone to," Watson said. "you can go pretty much anywhere with it."