Fundraiser Benefit @ Agrodome
Thursday, February 21, 2008

A note from an acquaintance…

Last year, one of the boys on my 8-year old son's hockey team lost his father – Gianfranco Giammaria, a teacher at St. Helen's here in North Burnaby. He passed away suddenly while playing hockey at Burnaby 8 Rinks due to a heart condition - SADS – Sudden Arrhythmia Death Syndrome. He was only 35 years old and left behind his wife (Denise) and three young children.

Denise and her family have put together an important event in his name "The First Annual Gianfranco Giammaria Memorial Hockey Game" on Sunday, March 2 at the Agrodome. All funds are in an effort to raise defibrillators for local ice rinks & awareness of SADS. Pat Quinn/Jeff Clarke are coaching the Canucks Alumni Team and Lui Passaglia/Ernie "Punch" McLean are coaching Gianfranco's hockey team, and the Canucks "Finn" will be there to cheer everyone on!

If you are free March 2, and want to be entertained and support a worthy cause, tickets are $10 each available through Ticketmaster (children under 5 are free) and there will be free parking. Please feel free to forward this to anyone you think might be interested in attending. And even if you can't make it, at least you have learned something about SADS and how tragically, for many young, otherwise healthy people, like Gianfranco, the first sign of SADS can be sudden death - there are often no discernable symptoms.

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

Rebecca Chau