ATVers always know how to have a good time.

The Optimist Club of Blackfalds, a community near Red Deer, held their first fundraising ATV and sled poker rally on February 6th. By all accounts, the event exceeded everyone’s expectations.

“One of the other Optimist Clubs (in our region) in a tiny Saskatchewan town raises around $35,000 annually, and they have a huge poker rally,” said Jeremy DeLeeuw, president of the Optimist Club of Blackfalds. “So we thought we’d have one ourselves. We expected to have around 50 people show up—we ended up with around 180.”

Participants ATVed over a 60-kilometre loop and made five stops to build up their poker hands. DeLeeuw said that, judging from the success of the first rally, the Optimist Club intends to make the rally an annual event.

Helping the community

The beneficiary from the fundraiser was the Blackfalds Field House Society (BFHS), which is working towards raising $750,000 to build an indoor field house.

“We gave the BFHS $4,500, which we raised from our 50-50 draw,” said DeLeeuw.

DeLeeuw said that Blackfalds has a young median age, making it a great location for a field house.

“There is a field house in Red Deer, but it’s on the other side of the town,” he said. “All we have is an ice rink.”

DeLeeuw, an avid ATVer himself, said there aren’t too many places in the immediate area to go quadding.

“That’s one of the reasons this was so well attended,” he said.