From rinks to golf greens, why the tradition of hiding a loonie goes on

It has been 15 years since the so-called "lucky loonie" was buried at centre ice in the hockey arena during the Salt Lake City Olympics.

The good-luck ritual continues at the Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro.

Loonies have been stashed in the sand at the beach volleyball court, in the rowing waters, even under the green of the 18th hole on the Olympic golf course.

An Ontario man who was helping build the pools in Rio doubled his offering, placing a toonie in the lining of the competition pool — where Canada has now scored six medals.

But why does it keep happening?

Paul Bowes, one of the coaches of the men's wheelchair basketball team, said it has become a Canadian tradition.

"It's just part of Canadiana in my opinion," he told CBC News. "I just think the lore of the loonie has been kept alive by, you know, teams that want to get creative. It's a fun thing to do."

Bowes has hidden his fair share of loonies — at the Paralympic​s in Athens (2004) and London (2012), where the team won golds, and in Bejiing (2008), where they scored silver. At each of those Games, he taped a loonie to the base of the standards at each end of the court. He claimed the coins when they won, but left them on the court when they got silver.

"Somewhere in Beijing, there's two basketball standards with lucky loonies taped underneath them if anybody hasn't found them yet."

Bowes isn't travelling to Rio for the Paralympics from Sept. 7 to 18, but he's keeping mum on whether the tradition will continue. "We've kind of talked about it," he said, not adding any more detail.

Keeping a secret

Hiding the coins can be tough. For wheelchair basketball, Bowes said the teams are only allowed on the court for a short practice and security can be tight. During the London Games, a colleague distracted those who were court side so Bowes could go and hide them.

"You just don't want to let anybody know that you're doing it because then other teams if they catch wind of it may wanna, you know, take it off or dispose of it or do something else ... until the Games are over, nobody needs to know."

Trent Evans took almost the same approach. He started the trend by hiding the loonie while making ice at the Salt Lake City Olympics in 2002, where both the men's and women's hockey teams won gold.

He made everyone he told about the loonie keep it a secret until the night before the men's gold-medal game. He was nervous the secret would be be spoiled. After Canada won gold, he went on the ice and pulled it out, then presented it to the team's executive director, Wayne Gretzky. It now lives in Toronto's Hockey Hall of Fame.

Evans, now a sales manager at Northlands in Edmonton, said he hasn't heard of any other countries burying coins for luck.

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"I do really think it's unique to Canada ... it's currency so everybody can have it," he said. 

"What was really striking is when you have a legend like Wayne Gretzky say to me, 'Trent, this is going to be a legendary story forever.' So when you have a legend like that say something like that to you, it really strikes home."

Loonies in skates

The Royal Canadian Mint latched onto the idea soon after the Salt Lake City instance and started creating speciality lucky loonies for the Games.

For Rio, they created five million of the loonies and gave one to each Canadian competitor.

Alex Reeves, communications manager with the Mint, said he has heard of athletes sowing loonies into their jackets, hiding them in their shoes and even putting them in their skates.

"I don't know why you would want to compete with added weight in your footware," he said.

Evans hasn't hidden any other loonies since Salt Lake City, but he's glad others have been doing so. 

"I had my moment," he said. "I stopped making ice in 2002 so it was a good way to go out.

"It's pretty cool how the story continues."