‘Pink Day’ coup in Glenn McGrath

What began as a fundraising lunch at a country harness racing club meeting 11 year ago will reach its biggest milestone this year – it’s going “national” and it’s secured Pink Day figurehead Glenn McGrath to its icon event, the Mother’s Day celebration race meeting at Shepparton.

Pacing for Pink was started by the Cobram Harness Racing Club as a measure to “bring the industry” together and demonstrate the good in the sport.

But the idea gained a momentum and energy of its own – driven by the hard work of some dedicated harness racing identities – and this year for the first time, every Australian State is on board and hopes are high of raising $100,000 for the McGrath Foundation.

“It’s just blown me away – last year we raised nearly $68,000 and that probably got us the recognition we needed to be able to get Glenn McGrath on board for Mother’s Day at Shepparton (May 8) this year,” said organiser Marg Watson.

“It was a massive event last year, and we had so much support from the industry and the community – but I’m just thrilled with the response we’ve had from interstate this year,” she said.

“The other States didn’t really have a good understanding of what Pacing for Pink was all about, but it got their interest last year and they’re all with us in a big way now! It’s just been the most wonderful thing.”

Both male and female drivers have been recruiting sponsors for the right to wear pink pants during their driving engagements in Pink Month (May). There’s just one day left (March 31) for drivers and sponsors to confirm their involvement but already, in addition to new and returning drivers in Victoria, NSW has 35 drivers confirmed, Tasmania 14, Queensland 12, and South Australia eight, with WA planning to be involved as well.

“All up we will have at least 120 drivers around the country wearing Pink Pants right through May – it’s fantastic because it raises funds firstly, but it creates awareness, it engages the sponsors and their networks and it gets people talking about the cause every day of the week,” Watson said.

Watson said the pink pants had originally been the idea of Ardmona reinswoman Donna Castles.

“We’d been running the event about four years when Donna suggested we find sponsors to get the female drivers wearing pink pants for the fundraising meeting,” she said.

“A few years later we issued the invitation to female drivers across the State, then last year we opened it up to all drivers basically because the men asked to be involved. And this year it looks as though we’ll have roughly 50 percent of the pink pants being worn by the male drivers!”

All of the funds raised during Pacing for Pink will be donated to the McGrath Foundation, which funds Breast Care Nurses. The Foundation was established in the name of Glenn McGrath’s late wife, Jane, who was just 31 when she was diagnosed with breast cancer.

Her experience and the impact of her own breast care nurse set the mission for the Foundation: to ensure that every family experiencing breast cancer has access to a breast care nurse no matter where they live – for free. Jane passed away in 2008, having secured funding for 50 McGrath Breast Care Nurses and fundraising since now allows 177 nurses to work in communities across Australia.

Watson said clubs including Mildura and Ararat in Victoria and Carrick in Tasmania were also running their own fundraising promotions during the leadup and in May.

“And the Shepparton community and businesses have also been amazing coming up with ideas to get involved in our special Mother’s Day event.

“It will be a real celebration atmosphere because the more people hear about it, the more people and businesses say ‘what can I do?’, which just goes to make the day better and fun for everyone, industry participants, mums, families and kids,” she said.

“We found out just a bit over a week ago that Glenn McGrath would definitely be coming and that just iced the cake – I never in my life dreamed when we started that our little event would come to this!”

By Terry Gange for Harnesslink