Ride for Quinny raised over $50,000
08/01/2021
The Ride for Quinny was a major success, raising over $50,000 for Lifeline Broken Hill in honour of a much-loved member of the Broken Hill community.
Co-organisers of the Ride from Quinny, Nick Mann and Jim Hocking said they were overwhelmed by the support and donations from locals. With hundreds turning out at the Memorial Oval on Saturday to see the 40 riders across the finish line in support of the ride in honour Bayden Quinn who suicided last year, it was an emotional day.
“I was a bit overwhelmed I mean considering the initial idea was just for me to ride from Menindee to Broken Hill,” said Mann.
“From what we’ve heard there were no complaints about the day, everyone had an absolute ball and it raised a lot of awareness so it was a really surreal experience to be part of,” said Hocking.
The riders enjoyed a strong tail wind on the journey out to the Tibooburra Road 50 kilometre mark, which allowed for chatting, banter and laughs.
However they were faced with an intense head wind for the 50 kilometre ride back, which challenged their grit and determination, with all riders giving their all for a good cause.
“It was a really tough push home but I was really proud to see everyone work together… We pulled up, had bit of a chat to say let’s all work together and we’ll get back to Broken Hill,” said Mann. “Cycling is a pretty individual sport but to have all these people working together to get us all home was fantastic.”
On the home stretch of Williams Street, the riders were greeted throughout the length of the main street, with locals pulling over and gathering to cheer and film to congratulate them on their efforts.
“It was pretty surreal, the part that really wowed me was riding up Williams Street — everybody had agreed to cross the line together and riding up Williams Street seeing that cars were pulling over, flashing headlights, waving, and filming. It kind of goes to show how big the event was, it wasn’t just locals riding it was an entire town behind it, so riding into the oval and seeing all the organisation come together was incredible,” said Hocking.
“It was pretty overwhelming to be honest, it blew away any expectations I had of what this event was going to be. I thought maybe if there was 20 or 30 people there I would have been stoked but when we got to the corner of the Memorial Oval and there was cars lined up out in the street and hundreds of people cheering,” said Mann.
“So it was pretty emotional coming in, having Kevin and Sheree at the front was just the cherry on top, to have them first and then Jim and I second. I had a bit of a tear in my eye going over the line, I was lost for words there for a bit.”
The initial fundraising target was $40,000 which was reached the morning of the ride, “We’ve gone well past our initial target of $40,000 and that was in two days so on the morning of the ride it ticked over to $40,000 so that was fantastic to start the ride having met our financial goal and then on Monday morning it’s at $50,000 so it’s crazy,” said Mann.
With such a successful event in Bayden’s name completed, the organisers are more than willing to make this an annual event.
“The response from the community was fantastic so if in 12 or 18 months down the track we can start it all up again and if we make even half what we made this time we’d be very happy,” said Mann.
“From the response we’ve seen and the amount of community spirit that was behind the event, I think we’d be mad not to make it an annual event,” said Hocking.
While the money raised is hugely beneficial, the main goal of the ride was to raise awareness about men’s mental health and eliminate the stigma.
“Men are terrible at telling people how we feel so if we can break that down and get people to talk about their feelings and if they’re not okay, reach out to a mate or Lifeline themselves,” said Mann.
“It’s just a taboo topic to speak about, people don’t like hearing the word suicide or depression and people don’t even like asking for help so if we can do an event like this and you have hundreds of people talking about how easy and important it is for people to talk and get things off their chest hopefully one, two, or 50 people can get help,” said Hocking.
Marisa Pickett, Operations Manager of Lifeline Broken Hill Country to Coast said the Ride for Quinny was an amazing success and they were blown away with the number of people at the Memorial Oval for the finish line, the encouragement and support shown to the riders and their families is a true testament to the culture of Broken Hill.
“What started out as Nick Mann wanting to do something to raise awareness of young men and suicide turned into a mammoth fundraising event for Lifeline Broken Hill Country to Coast,” she said.
“Because of Jordan Gilby’s run for Quinny, the Steve Radford Challenge and now the Ride for Quinny, Lifeline Broken Hill are able to secure enough funds to further support our counselling service and this year move forward with our program ‘How’s Ya Mate’ which is about raising awareness of mental health in youth, sport, in particular AFL and workplace,” said Ms Pickett.
“With two general counsellors on our team we feel confident that we are adequately covering any person who has a need in the Far West area.”
Lifeline, 13 11 14.
