By Adam Donnelly

Kamloops Y Strong Kids campaign wraps up for 2018

Mar 5, 2018 | 11:13 AM

KAMLOOPS — Every year the Y Strong Kids Campaign helps the Kamloops YM-YWCA raise funds that allow families to access health and wellness programs. This year, campaign organizers set their goal at $100,000, an amount that will allow 1000 kids to access many of the programs offered by the Kamloops Y. A new part of this year’s Strong Kids Challenge was the Strong Kids Games, a friendly competition meant to wrap up the corporate challenge.

Every year, the Kamloops Y helps hundreds of children and families in the Kamloops communities, by giving them free access to the Y facilities and programming. One reason the Y can offer those programs for free is that of the fundraising efforts of teams from the corporate community during the Strong Kids Challenge.

“Each [team] had to raise $5000 over the month, and then they end with the Strong Kids Games,” Kamloops Y Director of Fund Development Cheryl Breitkreutz explained.  

The Games consisted of a number of physical challenges, including a balance challenge, a plank challenge, a 10K bike challenge, and the most gruelling: the High-Intensity Interval Training challenges.

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“Everyone can compete, it’s kind of a wrap-up event,” Breitkreutz said. “It’s about health, it’s about commitment to families, so we wanted [the participants] to come here and experience that.”

And speaking of Strong Kids, Ben Baker was putting his strength on display early in the plank challenge. Ben took the early lead in the plank challenge, with a four-minute plank!

By the end of the plank, Ben said he was pretty tired.

“I was really sweating an everything,” Ben told CFJC Today.

It took until the final group to beat Ben’s time. Jacquie Brand managed to top the four-minute mark, by a whole minute.

“When I was hitting four minutes, I just wanted to beat the small child. Which sounds terrible, but I know he was the guy to beat,” Brand said.

And while the competitive juices were flowing amongst the competitors at the Strong Kids Games, the real winners are the children and families who benefit from the money raised during the Strong Kids Challenge.

“Our goal is to raise $100 000 to help 1000 kids in Kamloops,” Breitkreutz said. “That means they can come to Camp Starfish, they may do a teen summer program, they may go and do an early years program, swimming lessons… there are so many different things.”

While the corporate campaign has wrapped up, you can still donate to the Y Strong Kids Campaign at www.KamloopsY.org.