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Heart and Stroke hosting first annual Big Bike Battle in Red Deer

Jun 18, 2018 | 2:00 PM

Central Albertans are being encouraged to get their friends and co-workers together to help raise money for the Heart and Stroke Foundation during the First Annual Canadian Brewhouse Big Bike Battle.

The event is taking place in Red Deer this Friday.

Red Deer Fund Development Coordinator Leanne Schenn says they currently have ten teams registered to ride.

“We’ll be creating an oval track and we will do the event based on a point system to determine the winner,” says Schenn. “There will be points for online fundraising, offline fundraising, team spirit, number of riders etcetera. So we’re going to do three laps and then we’ll do a cool-down lap and we’ll see who stacks up against the others here in Red Deer.”

Funds raised will help support research on both cardiac and brain health.

“We advocate for healthy Canadians from coast to coast,” Schenn explains. “Some initiatives that we’re currently working on are the women’s initiatives, so how women have different signs and symptoms of cardiac and brain health. If women are having a heart attack or a stroke, chances are they don’t recognize that as quickly as what they do in men.”

Each team registered for the event will do individual fundraising with the proceeds first coming into the Heart and Stroke Foundation’s Red Deer office before being distributed to research projects closest to major break-throughs.

“I’m excited because the winner of the Big Bike Battle will receive a $1,500 gift card for the Canadian Brewhouse, but they will also get their name put on what we call our Research to Life Tour,” Schenn adds. “We host that twice a year at the University of Calgary and at the University of Alberta in Edmonton. Donors and teams get the opportunity to actually go and tour the facilities where the researchers that we fund are working, so you get to see first-hand where your money goes.”

She says their fundraising goal for the June 22 event is $40,000 with close to $30,000 of that already raised.

“I do have a couple teams that still have open seats but most of them are quite full,” says Schenn. “Or if they just want to get involved on their own without participating in the battle, I do have a couple dates still left this summer — August 20 we’ll be riding in Red Deer and then July 26. You can also look for us in the Westerner Days Parade.”

To register for the First Annual Canadian Brewhouse Big Bike Battle in Red Deer June 22, email Leanne Schenn at leanne.schenn@heartandstroke.ca or call 587-951-7105.

The event runs from 2:00 – 8:00 p.m. on Friday in the northeast parking lot of the Parkland Mall.