A Successful Charity Fundraising Event for Buildcare
On Saturday, November 5th, our first annual Breathe and Freeze charity event was held at Merewether Beach in Newcastle, Australia. The event saw teams of 21 participants at a time immersing themselves in ice baths to raise money and awareness for Buildcare.
The lead up to the event saw participants creating teams with family, friends, and workmates, fundraising and social media sharing, and exclusive breathwork coaching with Newcastles local breathwork guru – Gene Kelly @genekellylovesyou
On the morning of the challenge, Merewether well and truly turned on the charm, with bright blue skies and white sandy shores. The pools were erected and filled with ice, the challengers arrived, and the atmosphere was electric.
Before the dip into the cold, local breathwork expert Gene Kelly led all the participants in guided breathing exercises, designed to help learn techniques to optimise their breathwork and quality of life - and survive this challenge!
Spectators and support teams were on standby as we saw 118 bodies jumping in and out of the ice for set intervals.
There was a vast array of responses – from the stone-cold, speechless expressions through to the wiggles and screams that escaped as the ice made its way up to the neck of participants.
Thanks to the generosity, support, and fundraising efforts from the community, well over $35,000 was raised for Buildcare.
Due to the overwhelming response we received for this event, we are proud to announce that an annual Breathe and Freeze event will become a flagship fundraiser for the team at Buildcare.
A highlight of the day was seeing Jason push his limits (to those who have had the chance to meet him, you will have no trouble understanding how far he pushes limits) and get into the ice. As always, Will and his family and friends were right there beside him, along with the co-founders of Buildcare, Kaine and Dan.
So why ice baths? For many people who live with spinal cord injury, there is an inability for the body to respond to environmental changes in temperature. This results in individuals spending their days with either excessively high or excessively low body temperatures. This deregulation of body temperature management often occurs acutely following traumatic injury causing spinal cord injury and can persist for a lifetime with no improvement. By exposing able bodied individuals to the extremes of an ice bath, we can share just a fraction of the discomfort that people with these injuries face every single day.
Seeing the connection and sense of community created on the beach that morning was nothing short of phenomenal, and we are already in planning for the 2023 event.
Stay up to date with all our upcoming events by subscribing to our newsletter, and we can’t wait to see you join in next time!
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