By Callum Ludwig
The ninth edition of the Eastern 80 charity bike ride was held in perfect conditions on Saturday 17 February.
In what was believed to be a record turnout, riders broke through the early morning ‘Warburton mist’ to complete any of an 80km ride, 50km ride or 8km walk in support of the Royal Children’s Hospital’s Good Friday Appeal.
Eastern 80 Founder Norm Orr said the event was absolutely fantastic and it was good to see everybody in good spirits.
“We had a fair few young ones there this year, which was good because that’s what we’re trying to do, our demographic has changed a bit since we first started,” he said.
“The younger ones that started off are having families, so they’ve got different commitments, and us older ones are getting a bit older but we’re hanging in there.”
With sights set on a $100,000 fundraising total since the event started, this year’s event put the goal well in sight for the tenth edition next year.
Mr Orr said he is confident that they will be above $90,000 raised over nine years by the time te donations are tallied up.
“We had almost $6,000 by the time people had signed up online by Friday night and we had quite a bit of money being splashed around at the event so I’m very confident we can get to the $11,000 we needed,” he said.
“Hopefully my confidence is not misplaced, but it seems like we’re heading that way because we haven’t counted donations in the bank which takes about a week and the hospital has been great this year in helping us,”
“They have created a QR code for us where people can donate to the appeal. It goes straight to the appeal, but it is included in our total, and the code seemed to have been popular.”
The event was officially started by Casey MP Aaron Violi who set riders off, while it was also well supported by a number of local businesses: the Alpine Hotel had a QR code at the till to accept donations, the Carriage Cafe in Seville provided the turning point and a good spot for refreshments for the 50km riders, the Trail Cafe did the same for those travelling 80km, Mt Evelyn Butcher supplied sausages, Launch Fresh supplied bananas, Nine Mile Apples supplied apples and Healesville Aldi supplied lollies and fruit bars.
