Not To Be Trusted With Knives

Longest Game of Hockey for CF

March 12, 2011 by Beth

It all started with a missing chin strap.

A few weeks ago, I went racing into the pro shop at Burnaby 8 Rinks, in desperate need a chin strap for my helmet – my team was playing short without me and every second that went by meant I was missing ice time! The guys in the shop set me up with a chin strap and fixed my helmet to accommodate it in record time. As I thanked them profusely for their help, one of them said, “If you really appreciate this and want to give something back, check out this fundraiser we are having for Cystic Fibrosis. We need people to donate and to volunteer and, hey, do you want to play hockey for 10 days?” And that is how I first came to hear about the Longest Game of Hockey for CF.

The Longest Game of Hockey for CF is many things. It is:

• a fundraiser for Cystic Fibrosis Canada
• a way to raise awareness about Cystic Fibrosis
• a tribute to legacy of Eva Markvoort
• a Guinness World Record attempt to play the longest ever game of hockey in the world

The world record is currently held by a group of hockey players from Edmonton, who just last month played a hockey game that lasted 241 hours. We intend to beat this record by 65 minutes.

Yeah, I said “we.” Because rather than just signing up to be a volunteer, I’ve signed up to be one of the 40 women who will take to the ice for 10 days straight of hockey. Do I think this is just a little bit crazy? Yes, yes I do. Am I kind of scared at the prospect? Hells yeah! But am I going to do it anyway? Of course I am!

Raising Awareness

Since one of the goals of this endeavour is to raise awareness about Cystic Fibrosis, I plan to make blogging about the game and about CF a regular feature here on NTBTWK between now and when the puck drops on August 26 ((which just so happens to be my little cousin Eliza’s birthday. Eliza, like me, is hockey crazed, so this seems rather appropriate!)). And not like my usual I-have-good-intentions-but-then-do-not-actually-regularly-feature-my-regular-feature ((BC Premiers series, I am looking in your direction)). Because unlike the stuff I usually blog about, this matters! So expect to see a minimum of one blog posting per week about something to do with this from now until August! I’ve also talked to a few of my fellow bloggers (where by “fellow” I mean bloggers that are far more influential than I am! ((If you want to blog about this to, let me know and I can send you the media package))) and asked them to blog about the game as well.

Making It Through 10 Days

I am under no delusion that this will be easy. Hockey is an intense sport when you are only playing three periods at a time, so playing for 242 hours is going to be gruelling, both physically and mentally. We will not be allowed off the premises for the entire 10 days ((there will be RVs in the parking lot for us to sleep in on our very short breaks off ice)), and with only 20 players per team (i.e., a regular sized hockey team) and play going on continuously, we will be playing in shifts so that we can catch a few hours rest here, a chance to eat some food to keep us going there. This means we are going to need A LOT of volunteers to help us out with all aspects of keeping this game going for 10 days. Can you spare some time between August 26 and Sept 5 to help us out ((you don’t need to volunteer for the entire 10 days – just whatever time you can spare))? If so, you can register to volunteer on our website.

Raising Some Cash

The other aspect of this is to raise money for Cystic Fibrosis Canada. We are looking for both individual donations and for sponsorships. You could be the title sponsor for the whole event, or you could sponsor a day, a player or even a referee! I would love, love, love to find a company that would be willing to sponsor me as their player for the game! Love it, I say! If you know a company that would like to sponsor me, tell them to contact me!

But sponsorship is just a piece of it. Every individual donation helps us get to our goal! All you have to do to donate is to go to our webpage (for example, my bio page) and click on “donate now.” Just fill in the form, charge a donation to your credit card and you even get a charitable donation receipt. It’s just that easy. And if you aren’t comfortable with donating over the internets, let me know and I can provide you with a paper form that you can fill out and mail. Perhaps you could donate $242 – just $1 per hour that we’ll be playing. Or maybe $24.20? Or really any other amount that you are able to spare! Every little bit counts!

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