A colourful, creative and fun-filled fundraiser that helps support a wide array of local charities and non-profits is getting ready to celebrate its 16th year later this month.
Race to Erase, a friendly competition between enthusiastic, costumed teams who criss-cross Sarnia-Lambton to compete in a series of inventive and highly original challenges, is taking place on May 25.
Registration details and information for the event can be found at sarnia2024.racetoerase.com.
The brainchild of Hashtag Charitable Foundation executive director Rich Bouchard and Scott McKay – who came up with the concept back in 2006 – the annual event (which missed a few years due to the COVID pandemic) is designed to do a number of community-building things all at once: raise funds for local charities in need; encourage a day of fun-filled team-building among its participants; and highlight a host of worthy local businesses.
So far, the annual fundraiser has been an immense success, Bouchard said, having raised over $790,000 for charities in Sarnia, London and Cambridge. Last year alone, he said, 40 teams raised over $40,000 for local non-profits.
Each team of four registered for the event begins by raising a minimum $500 for the charity of their choice, then suits up for a day of discovery and adventure, facing unique and often highly amusing challenges at various stops in the community.
The Amazing Race-inspired event has been such a hit – both in terms of participant enjoyment as well as in terms of funds raised – that it has become a mainstay of Sarnia’s spring season,
Bouchard said.
“Scott and I met through an organization in town, we hit it off, we got talking during a game of golf and we realized both wanted to do something for the community. Scott had done something similar at his office…so we gave it a whirl back in 2006. It didn’t go as planned that first year as we didn’t know what we were doing,” he said, laughing. “But we made some changes after that, and it’s pretty much remained in the same format since 2007.”
“Part of the reason why we’ve been successful is that we do put in the work to make it new and different every year,” he added. “We haven’t repeated too many stop locations over the years or the challenges at the stops. We haven’t run out of ideas yet, it’s really geared towards the locations, and we always try to highlight something about the local business or organization, trying to sneak in some education there but making sure it’s always fun.”
Over the years, many teams have gotten much joy in overcoming some seemingly impossible challenges, Bouchard said. There have been plenty of belly-laughs along the way, too.
“There have definitely been some memorable challenges. One I always use as an example took place at (Point Edward’s) Ice Cream Galore,” he said. “Two people were blindfolded, one was the feeder and one was the eater and the other two teammates navigated. So we had this blindfolded person trying to eat a bowl of ice cream as fast as they could, because the challenge was timed, and there was lots of brain freeze, lots of misdirection by teammates just to see their colleagues covered in ice cream – it was very, very funny and everyone had lots of laughs.”
This year, teams can choose from ten local charities to support, including Pathways Health Centre for Children, Literacy Lambton, St. Clair Child & Youth Services, YMCA Sarnia-Lambton, Sarnia-Lambton Rebound, The Inn of the Good Shepherd, The Women’s Interval Home, SWONT Conductive Education, Errol Road School, and River City Vineyard.
Bouchard is hoping to have around forty teams participate in this year’s race.
“We had 40 teams last year, so we’re looking for around the same number this year,” he said. “Being able to combine groups in the community, to be able to raise funds for charity, highlight local businesses and sneak in some education in there, it’s a great, great event,” he continued.
“At the end of the day, it’s been really rewarding doing this for the last number of years and it’s the reason we keep going every year. We’re proud that we’ve raised $790,000 and we hopepeople have had a lot of fun with it.”