Ice Bowl 2016 Sets New Donation Record: $357K+
We are delighted to announce that the 13,140 disc golfers who played in 218 Ice Bowl events last January and February raised $357,452, which pushes the charitable total raised by Ice Bowls since 1996 to $3.51 million. This easily surpassed Ice Bowl 2016’s $350K goal and was the biggest year ever. Ice Bowl’s primary purposes are for local disc golf clubs and communities to raise money to fight hunger in their towns while having fun and burnishing a positive image for disc golf and disc golfers. All of our goals were amply met this year!
The top 25 fundraising events that are listed below accounted for over 50% of this year’s total. The top 5 events earned over 26% of the total and the top 11 events accounted for over 50%. These 11 Ice Bowls have earned special mention. For a list of all Ice Bowls, visit icebowlh.com.
The Mile High Ice Bowl near Denver, Colorado once again anchored Ice Bowl 2016, this time with an astounding, record-shattering $40,100 donation to the Food Bank of the Rockies. Jay and Michelle Burghardt led the Mile High Disc Golf Club’s superb effort, and they are not done. Jay told us that their goal is to join the Food Bank’s Million Meal Club, and to join such corporations as Wal-Mart, Kroger Foods, Pepsi Cola, Coke, Target, Kellogg’s, Whole Foods, and Chase Bank in having a banner hanging from the rafters of the Food Bank. With $171K raised to date, they are $79K short of that goal.
The Mile High Ice Bowl gave the best single Ice Bowl donation ever. Pictured are club members: Josh Kreutzer, Ray Woodruff, Michelle Burghardt, Jeff McCormack, Jay Burghardt, Jason Heimark, Lane Brewer, Lake McCormack, Jeff McCormack, Mr Evertz, Jeff Evertz
With a donation of $15,143 shared by the Lamoille Community Food Share and the Waterbury Area Food Shelf, Chris Young led the Vermont-based Green Mountain Disc Golf Club to its best-ever Ice Bowl donation and the second-best donation for Ice Bowl 2016 via the GFDGC Ice Bowl. The Club has now raised close to $64,000 in 10 years.
The Green Mountain Disc Golf Club! Photo courtesy of Mary Cosgrove.
Not too far behind in third place, with a $15,000 donation (and 1,000 lbs. of food) to the Kendall County Food Pantry, was the FVMDGC Ice Bowl in Oswego, Illinois. Tim Jones led the Fox Valley Metro Disc Golf Club to its biggest donation ever, which pushed the FVMDGC’s 9-year total to over $49,000.
The Fox Valley Metro Disc Golf Club
The fourth-highest donation came from the Tulsa Disc Sports Association with $13,111 for the Community Food bank of Eastern Oklahoma, which was their best-ever donation and the fifth year in a row the TDSA has raised over $11K. Let by Teresa and Doug Duff, the TDSA has now donated almost $76,000 in 21 years. With 505 players, the Tulsa Ice Bowl had the best attendance of any Ice Bowl.
The Tulsa Disc Sports Association drew an amazing 500 players to its Ice Bowl!
The final member of the exclusive $10K+ donation club is the Buffalo Ice Bowl, at which John and Eileen Mikulec raised a best-ever $11,073 for Hunters Hope, as well as donating food to the City Mission. This was the fifth-highest donation in 2016. The Mikulecs have now donated close to $70,000 via Ice Bowl in 11 years.
The Buffalo Ice Bowl is one of western New York’s most popular events.
Honorable mention goes to these six Ice Bowl events that raised over $5,000. The Kansas City Flying Disc Club raised $8,725 for Bishop Sullivan Center and Harvesters Food Network, boosting their 21-year totals to just shy of $76K. The Motor City Chain Gang near Detroit have now raised a total of $46,000 for the Detroit Capuchin Soup Kitchen with this year’s record donation of $8,700.
With $6,200 raised for the St Joseph Food Shelf, the St Cloud (Minnesota) Disc Golf Club’s 21-year total is now nearly $149,000, the second highest grand total of all Ice Bowl events. The Grand Valley (Colorado) Disc Golf Club raised $5,977 that was shared by Grand Valley Catholic Outreach, the Child and Migrant Services, and the Agape Food Basket of the Lower Valley. The GVDGC has now raised over $55,000 in 16 years of Ice Bowl.
With its all-time-best$ 5,650 donation for the Jasper Food Room, the Fayetteville (Arkansas) Disc Golf Association boosted its 12-year Ice Bowl total to almost $36,000 via the popular Horseshoe Canyon Ice Bowl. The LoCo Disc Golf Club in Northern Virginia had their best Ice Bowl ever, raising an 11th-best $5,600 for Loundon Interfaith Relief. This was the first Ice Bowl ever to use GoFundme.com to enhance charitable donations with over 30% of the total derived from this source. Look for more Ice Bowls to use this resource in 2017. In 11 years now, the LDGC has raised over $10,300.
Beginnings
When the first Ice Bowl was held in January of 1987 in Columbia, Missouri, it was an attempt to get more people out to play and to get some media coverage to promote a very new sport. The hook for the media, which was issued news releases, was that the event would be played regardless of the weather. Fortune smiled on the that first Ice Bowl when 5 inches of snow fell over night, and the exploits of its 34 players were covered on the front page of the sports page of the Columbia Daily Tribune. The event grew primarily through promotion through the pages of Disc Golf World News, and later DiscGolfer magazine. Ice Bowl started as a day of disc golf solidarity in the gloom of weather, but since 1996, its primary function has been raising funds for local charities, especially those dedicated to fighting hunger. Related goals are garnering positive publicity and developing community spirit while having fun.
Each Ice Bowl is asked to certify its cash donation via a receipt, letter from the charity, cancelled check copy, etc. Ice Bowl 2016’s certification rate, so far, is 80%.
30 Years of Ice Bowl
Ice Bowl 2017
The official Ice Bowl Corridor for scheduling Ice Bowl events in 2017 is from January 7 to February 26th. Registration will open in October. If interested in running an Ice Bowl event in your community, check out the FAQs from last year and/or contact Rick Rothstein at icebowl@discgolfworld.com or 816.471.3472.