It started with the desire of wanting to give back, a passion, founded in my own experience, which has morphed from a fitness challenge to a burpees challenge and is now an official Guinness World Record attempt.
My name is Dave Kramer and this my story of trying to repay the goodwill I received as a child.
I was the youngest of four, we lived in the care of our mum up until I was seven years old, we had various struggles.
I did not really think there was a problem; looking back I saw we survived on little and relied on the support of family and neighbours.
When I was five-years-old someone delivered groceries, I had never seen so much food.
I remember seeing the pile of grocery bags.
Which was followed by my thought “What happens when this runs out?”.
In the moment I believed two things.
Firstly, Superheroes are real and they delivered us food.
Secondly, one day I will become a Superhero and help other kids who are struggling.
I ended up overcoming those circumstances, striving to always be a compassionate coach, who seeks to help and inspire people to change their lives for their own betterment.
Three years ago I made the decision to start giving back to the people who I believe need help the most.
I looked for charities which support young people, I was knocked back seven times before I came across Brisbane Youth Service.
I connected strongly with what BYS does and their strengths-based approach and thought “Maybe they helped me when I was younger”.
I asked them if they would let me raise money for them through a fitness challenge, they were quick to accept.
We had raised $2000 by the half-way mark.
I decided it was not enough, I declared I would do a burpee for every extra dollar raised from then until the last day of the challenge.
In the last 10 days we raised $3000, and I did 3000 burpees in 8 hours.
So we went again in 2018, raising $7000 in the Burpees for BYS campaign.
8 hours of burpees, was 8 hours of cramps and pain.
But with those cramps and pains came motivation, the cramps and pain were reminders someone else was struggling, and I needed to keep moving for them.
The feeling from giving back for people who really need it was euphoric.
Every time I saw someone share the fundraiser, I felt touched.
To know other people care enough to share the message, and knowing how much of a difference it makes to those most vulnerable, gives the event purpose.
I knew 2019 would have to be bigger and better and you cannot have an event bigger than breaking a Guinness World Record.
This year we need the help of 1500 people to break the record for most people performing burpees.
The good news is participants only need two minutes of burpees at their own pace not 3000 in 8 hours.
Burpees for BYS, April 6 at the Southern Districts Basketball Centre in Carina.
To help BYS raise money and awareness for youth homelessness you can click this link to sign up for and break a world record.