Henry Downie of Team Vincent Motorsports ‘ecstatic’ to be a Champion for Charity
By Jeff Hicks
AYR —
Henry Downie’s ankles and heels were shattered. His shinbone was broken.
His right shoulder and knee were smashed.
On one side of his face, the orbital bone was pulverized.
“So I’m pretty used to getting beaten up,” recalled the 31-year-old sales associate on Saturday morning as he washed an all-terrain vehicle at Team Vincent Motorsports in Ayr to get the ATV ready for delivery to a good customer in Hespeler.
That Saturday morning accident six years ago put the Colborne-native in hospital for more than a month. Downie, a dirt bike racer since he was five, had been putting his laps in preparing for a race. A jump that he’d hit a thousand times before hit back on the landing. He crashed hard.
It was four months before he returning to his steel-working job.
So accepting the challenge to become one of Mandy Bujold’s 20 first-time boxers and Champions for Charity didn’t scare him at all.
Getting punched in the face for McMaster Children’s Hospital Foundation is an honour he’s eager to embrace at Tapestry Hall on April 12th.
“It’s something I’ve always wanted to try,” Downie said of boxing. “You know what? If I get punched and kids benefit from it, hey, I’ll give it to them.”
Downie has been diabetic since he was five. He got a lot of medical help growing up, the former hockey and lacrosse player says.
He also thinks of Wyatt, the 8-year-old son of his Team Vincent colleague Ashley Henrich.
The McMaster team has helped Wyatt overcome some significant hip issues over several years of treatments and surgery.
Wyatt, the grandson of Team Vincent owners Dave and Teri Vincent, loves being on a boat and riding a Sea-Doo. He also is an avid angler. He just to the green light to start playing hockey.
“They’ve been such a big part of his life,” Downie said of the McMaster Children’s Hospital team. “He’s such a great kid. It’s such a nice sight when he comes around the shop, to see the smile on his face.”
Downie, who lives in Alma with his partner Kala and her family, was smiling too when his Team Vincent colleagues delivered the news he had been selected to be a Champions for Charity after trying out at Mandy’s urging.
Henrich called him to the front of the showroom. Logistics guru Phil Molto, a former broadcaster, handed out a fake press release dressed as an olde-tyme reporter.
“It was fantastic,” Downie said. “I was ecstatic. I was on Cloud 9.”
Kala thought Downie had crashed one too many times to step into a boxing ring. Downies mom Jennifer was scare for her son’s life. But after that crash in Durham, how bad can boxing to raise funds for such a great cause be?
“She supports me 100 per cent,” Downie said of his mom.
“She says I’m going to kick some butt.”
www.ChampsForCharity.ca
To Support Henry, go to champsforcharity.ca
