The Takealot Tour of Good Hope road race will throw its weight behind the Olive Children\u2019s Foundation this year, using its status to raise awareness of young children who suffer from rare and life-threatening diseases.<\/p>\n
South Africa\u2019s premier road cycling tour takes place in the Cape Winelands from March 4 to 8 and ASG Events chief executive Erick Oosthuizen said supporting a charity was a key element of the whole operation.<\/p>\n
The event has received UCI status for the first time this year and this has resulted in a rise in interest from cyclists, both locally and abroad.<\/p>\n
\u201cSince its founding in 2006, ASG Sport Solutions has been as passionate about development and making a significant difference to the community as it is about cycling,\u201d said Oosthuizen.<\/p>\n
\u201cKnown for bringing innovative, sometimes rare, brands to consumers, this makes the partnership with the Olive Children\u2019s Foundation (OCF) a perfect fit as it was established to bring relief to families of children with rare conditions.\u201d<\/p>\n
OCF advertising and public relations manager Megan Schumann said they were extremely proud to be involved with the Tour of Good Hope.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis connection to the professional cycling industry and endurance racing sparked an interesting relationship with the local cycling community resulting in a wonderful response and commitment to the OCF,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Schumann added that there were a number of ways cyclists could support the foundation.<\/p>\n
\u201cOn entering, the riders will have the opportunity to make a donation to the foundation and be exposed to the charity, which was launched last year.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey will also be able to buy the specialised limited edition ASG cycling gear branded with OCF logos.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt the end of the tour, there will be blood donation stations for supporters and riders to register and even donate blood if they are up to it.<\/p>\n
\u201cApart from blood donations, financial donations and the various other ways to get involved, pure awareness about the OCF is crucial so that more children with rare diseases can be diagnosed and supported.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery time someone follows or shares any of our social media platforms, we get one step closer to finding eligible donors and potential DBA patients that have not yet been diagnosed.\u201d<\/p>\n
With the slogan of \u201cSave a Life, it\u2019s in your Blood\u201d, the foundation was named after a young girl, Olive, who was just six weeks old when she went into heart failure due to the anaemia caused by a rare genetic disorder – Diamond-Blackfan Anaemia (DBA).<\/p>\n
Schumann said DBA resulted in bone marrow failure, early onset cancers and congenital abnormalities, which required patients to receive regular blood transfusions and medical treatment throughout their lives.<\/p>\n
\u201cToday, at two years old, Olive has had 26 blood transfusions and spent over 137 days in hospital \u2013 a large portion of her little life.\u201d<\/p>\n
She added that the OCF had three main goals.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne is to create a space for doctors to research and learn about incredibly rare conditions such as DBA.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe second is to establish a registry across Africa to enable relief of the diagnosis and treatment costs and uncertainty for the families of affected children.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd thirdly we want to create an out-patient infusion clinic for children requiring regular blood transfusions and chronic IV therapies.\u201d<\/p>\n
In particular, she said, the vision of the Olive Children\u2019s Infusion Clinic had the potential of becoming a reality through the generous partnership with ASG Sport Solutions.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Olive Children\u2019s Infusion Clinic would be South Africa\u2019s first-ever paediatric day infusion centre, and would offer a supportive space where patients can be attended to in a non-threatening and supportive environment.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe extensive paperwork, delayed lead times for blood arrival and long waits will all be resolved in this clinic, which plans to offer a happy and informative space that is as close to normal life as can be.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Takealot Tour of Good Hope road race will throw its weight behind the Olive Children\u2019s Foundation this year, using its status to raise awareness of young children who suffer from rare and life-threatening diseases. South Africa\u2019s premier road cycling tour takes place in the Cape Winelands from March 4 to 8 and ASG Events […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":58746,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3260],"tags":[1743,30,2088,2087,3860,1919],"class_list":["post-26238","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-asg-events","tag-news","tag-road-cycling","tag-road-cycling-race","tag-road-cycling-tour","tag-tour-of-good-hope"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26238","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26238"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26238\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26238"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26238"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26238"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}