By Emma Hyde
A community fitness fundraiser will be hosted by Algonquin’s Pembroke campus Feb. 22, where participants will partake in three hours of exercise and raise a minimum of $100 to support the Algonquin College Capital Campaign.
Each participant will be able to choose from a number of sports activities to complete the challenge, including yoga, snowshoeing, ball hockey, and a number of other sports.
The event challenges participants on their dedication in more than one way. Their physical dedication will be challenged when they take part in three straight hours of exercise, while their dedication to the cause will challenged by requiring them to find enough friends, strangers, and colleagues to donate to their cause to allow them to reach their goal of a hundred dollars.
“We decided to allow participants to participate in as many events they would like,” said Jodi Bucholtz, a client service officer at the college. “So they don’t have to do three hours, but we challenge participants to attempt it over the whole days event.”
As someone who works at the fitness centre, Magdolen is generally someone who is informed on the different sports activities at the college. He made the point that the event possibly could have been better advertised around the
different campuses, rather than just in Pembroke.
The event will be held in the Algonquin College gym, and will run from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m., each sport taking up a separate half-hour timeslot. Students will take part in the different activities throughout the three-hour period to complete their fitness challenge.
But not everyone is aware that the fitness challenge is happening. Rich Magdolen, a student in sports business, and receptionist at the Woodroffe fitness centre, hadn’t heard
a thing about it.
“The promotion for this was not good,” said Magdolen. “I didn’t know anything about it. I didn’t even hear about it.”
The main goal of the event is obviously to help the community, but an event like this will also help students taking part.
They’ll be forced to test their discipline, and it teaches them how to be healthy in their own lives after their involvement.
Any students that registered for the fundraiser before Feb. 1 will be given a free body fat composition analysis, as well as a day pass to the Pembroke Best Western fitness centre.