Multiple Teams·
Giant Challenge featured on WIWU-TV
The inaugural Giant Challenge Alumni vs. Athletes event was a Giant success. More than 500 former and current athletes participated in the two-day, 10 event spectacular. Professional athletes such as Scott Wood, Ronnie Russell, Jackie Gallagher-Smith and Jeff Gallagher participated.
Mark Fauser can look back and see this last weekend’s Giant Challenge as a huge success.
Fauser, who helped organize all the events which featured alumni going up against current Giant teams, said there were plenty of highlights that came out of the weekend. And so far, the two-day event has raised $17,000 for the newly formed Marion High School athletic endowment. There are still other moneys coming in that have not been counted yet.
“For a fundraiser that we started in April and to pull all of this off by July, it was a success for our first year doing this,” Fauser said.
The athletic endowment was created this year to help provide moneys to the Marion High School athletic department. Fauser said the $5 spectator fee for each day’s events and the $25 fee for playing in the event was a good start to helping put money into the endowment.
The weekend started last Friday with a golf scramble at Meshingomesia Country Club. Pro golfers and Marion High School graduates Jeff Gallagher and Jackie Gallagher-Smith both returned for the scramble. That was followed by tennis at the Bill Beekman Tennis Courts and was followed by girls’ soccer and football at Dick Lootens Stadium.
The event then continued Saturday with a 5K run/1K walk, volleyball, baseball/softball, girls’ basketball, boys’ soccer and the event ended with boys’ basketball on Saturday night at the Bill Green Arena.
“We had people that really enjoyed playing in the events,” Fauser said. “And then after they were done they would write us a $500 check. It was just a great weekend.”
Fauser hopes the Giant Challenge will be an annual event. He said a group of organizers are going to get together next week and start working on ways to improve the event for next year. They are going to look on some of the areas they can improve on and want to set dates for next year’s Giant Challenge.
Once those dates are set, they are hoping to work with organizers of class reunions to see if they can get the class reunions scheduled on the same dates as the Giant Challenge.
Fauser said one of the highlights for him this past weekend was seeing Joe Voght, a 1954 Marion High School graduate, run in the 5K run on Saturday morning at Indiana Wesleyan University.
“It was just really neat to see a 1954 graduate run a 5K in close to 100-degree weather,” Fauser said. “This just shows that everybody matters when they put on a Giant uniform.”
Fauser enjoyed seeing Scott Wood, Jay Edwards and Julius Mays return for the boys’ basketball game. He also enjoyed seeing James Blackmon Sr. play for the alumni for the final three minutes of the game.
Fauser said he also liked the competitiveness of the girls’ basketball game and girls’ soccer game. The alumni won the girls’ basketball game 54-52 and the girls’ soccer game 3-2. Fauser also liked when the girls’ basketball team came out and challenged the boys’ basketball team during the boys’ basketball game on Saturday night.
The alumni won five of the seven events against the current Giants.
