All-day tread-a-thon raises funds, awareness for drowning prevention
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Tillsonburg lifeguards Bryce Pittock, Carley Corbeil and program coordinator Julie Dawley successfully met their target of treading water for seven hours Saturday during the annual Tread-A-Thon at the Tillsonburg Community Centre.
"It was a long, long day," said Dawley moments after climbing out of the Kinsmen pool at 4 p.m.
No surprise, there were some minor side affects.
"Pruny hands," Dawley laughed, showing her wrinkles. "Take a picture!"
"We're in a lot of pain," admitted Corbeil, jokingly adding, "For a lifeguard, seven hours should be nothing."
"It was painful," said Dawley. "Being cold, I find that's the hardest."
"The legs do really hurt," said Corbeil.
"We feel like we weigh a thousand pounds now," said Dawley.
"I wonder if we lost any weight?" Corbeil wondered, and after hopping on a scale discovered she had lost six pounds.
While both swimmers took a quick bio break or two, Pittock was the only swimmer to stay in the water the entire seven hours without any breaks.
"He's a camel," said Dawley.
"I find the repetition's the hardest," said Pittock, who had treaded water for two-and-a-half hours last year. "Everything starts to get sore after four hours or so."
"The hardest part? You get really bored in the pool," quipped Corbeil, who treaded water three hours last year. "Seven hours in the pool?"
The tread-a-thon challenge was first introduced in Tillsonburg in 2011 as a fundraiser for Drowning Prevention, returning in 2012 for the Community Centre's 40th anniversary activities. Dawley started treading water for four hours, each year adding an hour, working her way up to seven hours Saturday.
"This was the first time we've offered it on a Saturday," Dawley noted, "and we did that so we could reach more of the public. We were hoping we'd have more people join us."
Promoting the event, organizers encouraged people from the community to see if they could join them for 'an hour or two.'
"We wanted people to see how long they could tread water. The average swimmer can probably tread water for about a half an hour. We did have a couple people join us – one of our adult swimmers made a donation and joined us, and she stayed for an hour. We even had a couple of little kids, 3 and 5, with life jackets on, and they treaded water for an hour.
"Our whole staff started off the day with us, and then they slowly dwindled off as they had to do stuff. We were the three that committed for the day. We also had some people joining us for the afternoon."
Dawley is already looking forward to their 2015 tread-a-thon next December.
"We'd love to see it even bigger next year. I think we're going to try to keep it the first weekend of December, just so people get used to it."
Unsure of the exact fundraising total Saturday, Dawley estimated it would be about $500 raised for the Lifesaving Society's Drowning Prevention Campaign, as well as raising awareness for Drowning Prevention. While treading water, they were encouraging people to pick up the 'Within Arms' Reach' Water Smart Advice for Parents brochure, focusing on the problem of drowning in Canada and ways to prevent drowning, as well as literature on Lifesaving Society ice safety tips (www.lifesavingsociety.com).
"We got a lot of donations today, too," she noted.