Daughter Sadie walks Champion for Charity Jason Hunke into the ring for MacKids
By Jeff Hicks
www.champsforcharity.ca
AYR —
A brown-eyed girl with a mischievous smile has a vice-grip on her dad’s heart.
She’ll wear a flowing blue dress Fight Night as she walks her father, Jason Hunke, into the boxing ring at the centre of The Brawl at Tapestry Hall.
Caramel blonde hair. Petite, but mighty. Fierce and utterly adorable.
Sadie is all those things.
A decade ago, as Jason and wife Christina celebrated their wedding anniversary. she was born eight weeks early.
“I could hold her in the palm of my hand,” recalled the 37-year-old Hunke, one of Mandy Bujold’s Champions for Charity first-time fighters who has helped raise more than $609,000 for McMaster Children’s Hospital and MacKids.
No need for the anxiety-ridden parents to retreat to a panic room, like the Hunke family construction business has built alongside fancy local eateries and the spare bowling alley.
McMaster was there for Jason and Christina as tiny Sadie grew under doctors’ care and, after more than a month in hospital, came home to Ayr.
Christina spent 24-hours a day at Cambridge Memorial Hospital as she recovered from Sadie’s early arrival. McMaster specialists came from Hamilton to help supervise her care.
It seemed all of Ayr pitched in to help the Hunke family. Extended family and neighbours helped make sure Sadie’s older brother Jase, now 12, was taken care of too while Jason could attend to the family business he took over from his dad Bob.
But the special relationship with the McMaster medical staff — who helped with Christina’s pregnancy, testing & care — grew over time.
“Our families have gotten close throughout the whole process,” said the Petersburg-raised Hunke, a former Jr. B hockey player with Kitchener and Waterloo.
“It’s definitely a unique thing.”
As unique as Hunke’s three-word plea to Bujold at last year’s Brawl at Tapestry Hall, where Ayr’s Henry Downie fought for the Blue Team with Hunke’s nephew Wyatt in mind. Wyatt, now 9, continues to make progress overcoming a hip condition with McMaster’s ongoing treatment.
Hunke wanted to be part of the next Champions for Charity event in 2025.
“I want in,” Hunke told Bujold.
Sounds simple, right? If only it was.
Christina was ailing. A few years ago, she suffered a severe concussion on the family’s outdoor rink. He felt it wasn’t fair for him to go off on a boxing escapade while she struggled.
The family now had four kids.
Jase, selfless and courageous, was the oldest.
Eli, a kind soul, is now 6.
Tripp, a ball of fun, is 4.
“Three boys and one girl — and I’d pick the girl in a fight any day,” Hunke said.
“There’s a lot of fun in the chaos.”
But the chaos was not something he wanted to hand over to Christina to deal with while he trained for Champions for Charity.
“My lovely wife does everything for me between business, home, sports,” Hunke said.
“She is my anchor in all aspects.”
He decided not to try out.
Luckily, Christina and Sadie conspired to make Hunke’s Champions for Charity dream come true. Without telling him, the women of the family signed him up. He got the email and was stunned.
“We know you want to do this. We know you’ve got it in you,” said Christina, who has started felling better recently.
“Do it for the family.”
So Hunke, who has raised nearly $32,000 for MacKids as a Champion for Charity, is ready to stroll into the ring with other local business leaders and community-minded professionals on April 4.
Invincible by Pop Smoke — a song picked by the kids — will march him into the squared circle as a member of the Blue Team.
Wyatt, Jase and Eli will walk beside him.
Maybe Tripp too.
Sadie, who once fit in the palm of Hunke’s hand, will wear a long blue dress and join them.
“She’s still very tiny but she doesn’t back down from much, that’s for sure,” Hunke said.
“She’s a firecracker.”
www.champsforcharity.ca
To support Jason, click here.
