With around 200 bags of ice, and a Dame Edna impersonator, Drysdale Football Netball Club has raised around $55,000 so far for the fight against motor neurone disease. See all the sliders in the gallery.
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The Drysdale Football Netball Club is reporting a decent bump on its debut fundraising effort of last year so far following its second annual Big Freeze event on Sunday.
Event organiser Graeme Reid said early counts revealed about a 30 per cent jump on 2022 figures.
“At this stage last year, we were around about $43,000, I reckon now we should be about 55,” Reid said.
The debut Big Freeze at Drysdale raised almost $64,000.
Sliders this year included club co-ordinator Jess Case as Dustin Martin, St Thomas Catholic Primary School principal Lucy Wright-Smith as Dame Edna Everage and Geelong Advertiser editor Nadja Fleet as the Cat in the Hat.
“She stole the event,” Reid said of Wright-Smith
“The costume was fantastic and she was in character.”
Reid said the Big Freeze had become a showpiece event on the club’s social calendar, with Fight MND Foundation campaign director Rebecca Daniher also in attendance.
“It’s a really popular day,” he said.
“The moment somebody goes down, we all just start laughing.
“It just never gets old.
“You can actually watch people do it all day, they all land in different positions and they’re all at a different level of nervousness too.
“Some were literally shaking up the top … they’re shaking with fear and shaking with the cold.”
He said after dumping about 200 bags of ice into the pool, the weather cleared up just in time for the sliders.
“Right up until about half an hour before the slide started, it was really overcast and a little bit foggy,” he said.
“But it opened up to be a beautiful day.
“There was hardly a cloud in the sky, the weather was perfect, it was like a Spring day for just a few hours.”