A couple of month’s ago we were extremely lucky to be contacted by Mike Crane the new Captain of Wickham Golf Club. He was extremely interested in choosing us for their Charity of the Year, a role he took over in April of this year.
We were so happy and excited to have been given this opportunity and jumped at the chance to build new relationships and to forge a collaboration.
We invited Mike in to take a tour of our centre and to show him first hand the amazing work our fantastic Conductors and their wonderful assistants do. Mike was interested to see for himself exactly what we do here as although he was aware of our centre, he had no idea of the number of Children and Adults with Neurological Conditions we could cater for. In fact, for many years he had been under the impression that The Rainbow Centre only catered for Children.
After his tour Mike was even more determined to do the best, he could in not only raising funds for our centre, but also raising as much awareness as possible as he realised there would be many Adults and Children within our community and further afield that would hugely benefit becoming part of The Rainbow Family.
Mike was full of enthusiasm and had some fantastic fundraising ideas, we spoke about Charity Golf Days, the first one was held on Saturday 13th April 2024. PO went head-to-head with SO in a challenge to see who could reach the 18th hole first with an outstanding win of 12-5 by SO much to Mike’s disappointment!
The event was extremely successful and over £500 was raised through a Masters sweepstake and a fabulous raffle run by the Ladies Captain Janet who has also been kind enough to come onboard to join Mike in assisting him with the mammoth task of raising funds for us.
A fantastic day was had by all, and it was an absolute honour to be part of it, it was so good to be able to chat to the participants and their families and raise awareness of the amazing work done here at The Rainbow Centre. We definitely managed to ensure that everyone went away knowing who we are and what we do.
Mike and Janet are now in the planning of further events to raise more money. A Ryder Cup event in August and a Captains Day in September are both in the pipeline alongside a regular way of generating an income through fines for landing in the Captains Charity Bunker and players being encouraged to add a donation to their fees each time they play.
All in all, it seems as if Mike really knows how to get everyone on board and many of the players stated on Saturday how wonderful it was to finally start feeling the sense of community and camaraderie which was so sadly lost when Covid hit. We are looking forward to the nest event and so very grateful to have such fabulous people on board supporting us.
Thank you so much Wickham Park Golf Club, the difference you all will make to the lives of our Rainbow Families will be huge.
