Folk Festival ticket sales on pace to beat last year’s total

Einarson gets world curling redo in Prince George

Kerri Einarson and Prince George, B.C., are about to get a women's world curling championship do-over.

Einarson, third Val Sweeting, second Shannon Birchard and lead Brianne Meilleur had just arrived in that city two years ago fresh off their first Canadian championship as a team and ready to curl for a world title.

The 2020 women's championship was among the early international sporting events engulfed by the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Canadians and the rest of the international teams quickly headed home when it was cancelled and the sporting world went dark.

Broadening prediction-market gambling a bad idea

Let’s make a prediction: sooner or later, when Canadian governments find a way to take their own cut of the action, prediction-contract gambling on everything from sports to entertainment to political decisions is going to come to Canada.

And that’s a horrible, dangerous, pernicious idea.

Unless you have particular access to information — either inside information or strategic information based on skills or education — you’re not likely to make money at it. In fact, structurally, you’re likely to lose. In prediction markets, you basically pay an amount, plus fees from the company involved, to bet on whether something will or will not happen within a certain time frame. The amount you pay for your contract depends on how other people are also betting.

As Wealthsimple describes it, “You buy whichever side you think is right. Prices move with demand, so if the market leans towards one outcome, the more that side costs. If a lot of people are backing the TSX to finish above 38,000, yes gets more expensive and no gets cheaper.”

Around the NSL: Silano’s spectacular strike; Rapid treading water; Post-season posturing

And just like that, the Northern Super League playoffs are nearly set with only fourth place — and home-field advantage, of course — up for grabs.

AFC Toronto is on a tear, and the Wild continue to terrorize the post-season race. Week 23 was a wild ride — pun intended.

With three weeks of the regular-season schedule remaining, the crystal ball of who has the best chance of taking the Diana B. Matheson Cup has never been cloudier.

And with a pivotal Friday night matchup, here’s an early edition of View from Row Z.

Anhang widow faked Jewish heritage to find refuge in Israel, trial told

SAN JUAN, PUERTO RICO — Looking for a safe refuge from American justice, the widow of murdered Winnipeg native Adam Anhang used forged documents to claim she was Jewish, and then asked an Israeli lawyer: “How can I be protected? Is Israel American soil?”

A jury in San Juan heard the account of international deception Friday in the trial of Aurea Vazquez-Rijos, accused with her sister and a boyfriend of conspiring to have Anhang killed in 2005 in a bid to get their hands on millions of dollars from his estate.

The forgery scheme, which included the widow’s mother and brother, was revealed through the introduction of dozens of emails and documents by the prosecution, which closed its case Friday.

Vazquez-Rijos was not Jewish; however, in her pre-nuptial agreement with Anhang in 2005, she promised to convert to Judaism within two years of their wedding. Anhang was killed six months later in an assault on a San Juan street, with his wife by his side. The killer later told police he’d been promised $3 million by the three accused to kill Anhang.

Olympics overnight: Synchro divers spring to silver, while Penny Oleksiak powers relay team to Canada’s first medal in Tokyo

Here’s what you missed overnight and need to know about the 2020 Tokyo Olympics this morning.