VIDEO: Paddleboarders compete in South Surrey fundraiser<\/p>\n
Published 2:38 pm Friday, July 24, 2026<\/p>\n
Plenty of paddleboarders gathered to compete for a good cause in South Surrey Thursday, in Surrey Memorial Hospital Foundation\u2019s annual Champion of the Crescent fundraiser.<\/p>\n
Held each year to support child and youth mental health programs and efforts, paddleboarders joined teams and vied for a chance to win the coveted Champion of the Crescent trophy in a fast-paced, elimination-style relay race.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Presented by Ellis Don, the charity event is now in its eighth year, and attracts competitive paddleboarders from all over the local community, including Surrey Fire Services members, who are perennial champions at the event.<\/p>\n
After Indigenous drummers opened the event with a performance, Surrey Hospitals Foundation chief development officer Maria Faccio introduced herself as master of ceremonies and thanked everyone for coming.<\/p>\n
\u201cToday we unite for a cause close to all of our hearts \u2014 supporting youth mental health in Surrey and in the South Fraser region,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Surrey Hospitals Foundation president and CEO Nicole Robson also thanked everyone for being there to support mental health in young people in the region.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to thank you all for coming out today. I think we know why we\u2019re all here, and that\u2019s to beat the firefighters,\u201d she quipped, to laughter from attendees. \u201cOK, I\u2019m just kidding. Or not \u2026 thank you for coming together for this important cause to really help youth mental health,\u201d Robson said. \u201cWhat you may not realize is one in four kids in B.C. deal with a mental health crisis or issue. And it starts really young.\u201d<\/p>\n
More than $1.5 million dollars has been raised through the event since it started eight years ago, she shared.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn Surrey \u2014 what is about to be the largest (B.C.) city with 30 per cent of our population under the age of 20, you can understand why it\u2019s important to invest in the services here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Chief operating officer and executive vice president construction Western Canada at Ellis Don David McFarlane also spoke.<\/p>\n
\u201cLet\u2019s have a lot of fun. Just remember why we\u2019re here. We\u2019re here for the kids, but we\u2019re also here to raise money to help with the programs that we can provide at Surrey Hospitals Foundation,\u201d he said. \u201cSo let\u2019s have a great day.\u201d<\/p>\n
In total, 25 teams of paddlboarders raised more than $213,500 in support of regional youth mental health programs at Surrey Memorial Hospital, according to the SMFH website.<\/p>\n
Visit surreyhospitalsfoundation.com\/paddle2026 to learn more about Champion of the Crescent.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"VIDEO: Paddleboarders compete in South Surrey fundraiser Published 2:38 pm Friday, July 24, 2026 Plenty of paddleboarders gathered…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":824560,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194299],"tags":[49,48,87674],"class_list":["post-825002","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-surrey","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-surrey"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/825002","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=825002"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/825002\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/824560"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=825002"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=825002"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=825002"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}