The women at Port Coquitlam Curves were so confident that they could beat Port Alberni Curves in a food drive, that they bet the shirts off their backs—literally.
Port Coquitlam lost; and now they’ll have to pose for a nude calendar.
The wager began last year, when the PoCo Curves gym—managed by former Port Alberni resident Kim Blake—challenged Port Alberni during breast cancer month.
“They wanted to challenge us again for our food challenge last month,” Port Alberni manager Trudy Johannessen said.
Poco lost by 107 pounds. Port Alberni Curves members won by donating 2,535 pounds of food.
At first the PoCo women—aged 40 to 78—were mortified, but after two brave souls who lost breasts to cancer signed up, the rest joined in.
“The women love that we are helping women and girls that are in Port Coquitlam,” Blake said.
Funds raised from the sale of the calendars will go to Tri-City Transitions and a social development program for girls run by the Learning Disabilities Association.
The Port Alberni Curves members were relieved. “Very much so,” Johannessen said.
“We had all the members worried that if they didn’t do their three workouts a week they would be first for the calendar.”
The naked truth about the wager, however, is it was all done in fun. Blake used to be a member of Curves when she lived in Port Alberni. She saw Johannessen’s name in an article in a breast cancer magazine and got in touch.
The 2012 calendars, which the PoCo members are going to call “The Birds of McAllister”, after a nickname one of the member’s husbands gave them, will be for sale in the fall. Johannessen said Blake promised to send some copies to Port Alberni, and they’ll be available for sale at the gym on Sixth Avenue.
Meanwhile, the Port Alberni Curves is gearing up for the Heart and Stroke Foundation’s Big Bike Ride on June 15.
editor@albernivalleynews.com
— With files from the Tri-City News