Property Industry Continues to Wipeout Dementia

HEIDI DOUGLASS | h.douglass@unsw.edu.au

Senior executives from Australia’s property industry are spending the next month increasing their physical activity in the lead up to the tenth Wipeout Dementia; a surf off contest at Bondi Beach which raises funds for dementia research at the Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA). 

45 surfers across five teams (listed below) will compete in this year’s property industry event alongside Wipeout Dementia Ambassador and 1978 World Surfing Champion Wayne “Rabbit” Bartholomew AM, with the first ever Battle Royale occurring at the end of the Surf Off. 

Sponsor a surfer here.

“It’s been terrific to watch the property industry embrace this concept,” said Richard Grellman AM, Spokesman of The Dementia Momentum and Chairman of IPH Limited and FBR Limited.

“I thought the property guys might do one and move on but they’re bigger and better every year.”

Following significant support for Wipeout Dementia from Colliers International Residential, it was Peter Clemesha of Avenor who led the charge in creating a property industry Wipeout Dementia event in November 2016.  This year fellow team captains are Philip Vivian of Bates Smart, Craig Rodgers of Charter Hall, Steve Watson of Steve Watson & Partners and Darren Beasley of Aoyuan. 

The appeal of Wipeout Dementia – beyond a love of surfing – is that all funds raised go directly to research at CHeBA thanks to major sponsor Morgans and secondary sponsors Aoyuan International, m3property, Winten Property Group and Colliers International Residential. 

The participants have already raised $50,000 of their $200,000 target, with surfing representatives across sponsor organisations as well as CBRE, Shape Australia, Buildcorp, Parkview, FDC, Lendlease, Capital Bluestone, Stamford Capital, Sense Projects, Haigs Builder Brokers and many more. 

This fundraising event is in honour of Richard’s wife Suellen, who has advanced young onset Alzheimer’s disease and requires high level full-time care and attention. 

"For me, Wipeout Dementia has been a blessing because when your life partner embarks upon the journey that Suellen has been on, you quickly realise that you have no meaningful purpose to play in her care because that’s been attended to by professionals who know what they are doing.” 

“Wipeout Dementia has given me the opportunity to actually do something," said Mr Grellman.

CHeBA Co-Directors, Professors Perminder Sachdev AM and Henry Brodaty AO said they were encouraged by the enthusiastic support received from the property industry to date.

“Wipeout Dementia is a fantastic opportunity to increase awareness about how physical activity has positive and protective effects on brain function,” said Professor Sachdev.

Richard Grellman confirmed that the 2019 property industry goal was to raise $200,000 to advance the large-scale, “big data” research being conducted at CHeBA. 

To sponsor one of the Wipeout Dementia surfers go to: https://cheba2.everydayhero.com/au/wipeout-dementia-property-industry-2019

For more information about the Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA), visit www.cheba.unsw.edu.au

For more information about The Dementia Momentum go to https://www.thedementiamomentum.org

Morgans is the major sponsor for Wipeout Dementia November 2019.
Secondary sponsors are m3property, Winten Property Group, Aoyuan International and Colliers International Residential.  Hurley is apparel sponsor.  

ANNOUNCEMENT OF 2019 PROPERTY INDUSTRY TEAMS: