Center Grove will host a swimathon Saturday to benefit Special Olympics Johnson County.
Daily Journal file photo
Each year, Redwood Logistics holds a team building event called the Redwood Games, which pits teams of employees against one another in a fundraising competition. In the past, the company would choose one beneficiary, but this year it decided to let each competing team pick its own.
A swim dad at Center Grove, Brian Lewis knew exactly who he wanted his team to help.
On Saturday, Redwood will partner with Center Grove Aquatic Club to host a one-hour swimathon from 11 a.m. to noon that will raise money for Special Olympics Johnson County.
The event is open to any Special Olympics swimmers as well as USA Swimming or USA Masters Swimming members.
Lewis has a stated fundraising goal of $12,500, and he’s hoping to have 50 or more people show up to the event on Saturday. The swimathon itself isn’t as much about the fundraising, although donations there will certainly be welcome.
“It was really an opportunity to bring people together in a focal point just for awareness,” Lewis said.
Jason Hite, who coaches the SOJC swim team, was fully on board when Lewis approached him with the idea.
“The bottom line is, anything we can do to advocate for Special Olympics athletes, intellectually disabled individuals,” Hite said. “We have athletes on our team ranging all the way from 9, 10 years old to mid-60s, and the money that’s going to be raised is just going to be able to give them opportunities that maybe they wouldn’t have, whether it be equipment or it be sending them to the state games. … So we were definitely on board.”
Mark Madden, another Center Grove swim parent and SOJC volunteer, and Chris Rosser of the Greenwood Rotary Club have also both helped Lewis and Hite with organizing the event; Madden and Rosser both have children in the program.
SOJC offers 10 different sports for its athletes, ranging from more common sports like basketball and track to niche sports such as equestrian. Local swimmers are generally able to train twice a week at Center Grove, with a competitive season running from March to June. SOJC community chair Linda Boothe hopes to be able to host a meet each spring so that athletes can get official times to qualify for the state games (or eventually the 2026 USA Games).
She and Hite also hope to be able to provide new equipment for all of their swimmers.
“We need boards,” Boothe said. “We would like to get swimsuits so that all of the swimsuits are the same. … We do caps for them, we need goggles … goggles are not cheap.”
Redwood is a Chicago-based company, so it will split the money raised at Center Grove between the Special Olympics programs in Illinois and Indiana — but it announced that it would match all funds raised this year, which essentially means all of the swimathon money will be going straight to SOJC.
New Era has donated baseball caps for the event that will sell for $25 each; Lewis is hoping those will help push fundraising efforts past the goal amount.
Redwood’s fundraising campaign runs through Nov. 15. To make a donation online, visit https://givebutter.com/redwoodgames2024/Champions4Change. Donations can also be made by texting REDWOODGAMES to 53-555; donors should select CHAMPIONS4CHANGE to benefit Special Olympics.
