Always Live with hope that is the challenge.
The Hope Challenge is an annual 12-hour game of touch football, where registered players see how many hours they can play. This year the game will be played during the hours between 8:00 am to 8:00 pm on Sunday August 25, 2019 at Lofberg Oval the home of the KWP Rugby Club.
Players seek sponsorship for each hour that they play and maybe even earn a bonus for any tries they may score during their playing time.
The game is open to all ages, all sexes and all abilities. This is a fun community day. Why not register to play now? Or just come along to watch and enjoy the day.
It is titled The Hope Challenge to honour a local from the West Pymble community. During the year 2000 several Dads met while dropping off their children at a local West Pymble school.
It was found they had common ground so they banded together to play a social game of touch football every Sunday at one of the ovals in Bicentennial Park, West Pymble.
Even though those children have now left school, the game goes on. It has expanded, some of the originals still play, some of their children now play, plus many others from the local community also boost the weekly numbers.
On May 12, 2016, one of the original players, Dr. Rick Hope, took his own life. Diagnosed just one month earlier with bipolar disorder, his death shocked and grieved many of the local community. Hopey was a loved and respected member.
At the funeral the Hope family asked that, in lieu of flowers, donations be made to the Black Dog Institute. The social touch footy players decided something extra could be done to not only raise money for mental disorder research through the BDI, but also raise awareness of the insidiousness of this disease.
The Hope Challenge is the result.
It plans to do four things:
1. Pay respect to our friend Rick Hope with a fun day the whole community can enjoy
2. Raise money for the Black Dog Institute for research into mental disorders
3. Raise awareness among the general public about mental disease
4. Hopefully show other sufferers the disease does not define them; they are still and always will be a loved and needed family member, friend and member of their own local community.
The logo is designed to highlight point 4. The black dog is dwarfed by its white dog 'shadow'. The Hope Challenge hopes all mental health disorder sufferers come to realise that the disease they suffer is but one part of what makes them human. The white dog also symbolises the support that is readily available from medical to loved ones, family, friends and the wider community.
Always strive for Hope, that is the Challenge.
