Last night my family and I went to the Hometown Celebrity Softball Challenge that took place at Victory Field in Indianapolis, Indiana. It was an absolutely great event. The weather in Indy was perfect and there was plenty of fun things to do.
The entire event was to help benefit the Indiana Children’s Wish Fund. Due to the price of the event, only $5, the stands should have been much fuller. Next year, we need to make sure we publicize this even more and get more fans there.
Before the event there were a number of carnival type games that the kids could do for free. My son tried his hand at a few, threw a 36mph pitch at one game. I gave it a try and surprised myself a bit by throwing 55mph.
Unexpected too was some Star Wars actors there in full garb. Got some photos with them. Also got to see the Indianapolis Colts Super Bowl XLI Vince Lombardi trophy. We got our photo with that to help HoosersHelpingHoosiers.org, but that photo hasn’t been posted on their site yet, so waiting on that.
There were loads of local celebrities and athletes on hand for the game. Here are just a few of the people that I can think of that were there:
Robert Mathis, Peyton Manning (didn’t play, but showed up), Dwight Freeney, Gary Brackett, Raheem Brock, Tyjuan Hagler, Melvin Bullitt, Ed Johnson, Bob Sanders, Jeff George (former QB) and Jack Trudeau (former QB) of the Indianapolis Colts. Stephen Graham and Boomer from the Indiana Pacers. UFC fighter Chris Lytle. Ryan Thompson, former Indy Indians and New York Yankee.
Megan Meadors (Miss Indiana), Bailee Zimmerman (Miss Teen Indiana)
Media personalities included Big Joe Staysniak, Amber Stearns and Dan Dakich from WIBC. Anthony Calhoun from WISH-TV8. Rich Nye from WTHR 13. Carlos Diaz, a Greenwood High School alum, now on the TV show Extra! Det. Christine Minka from the TV show "The Shift", which is about the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department.
There’s plenty more people I can’t remember or don’t know their names, so whomever I missed please let me know and I’ll add them to the list with a link to their website.
I’ve got a number of photos from the event you can see on my flickr account here.
[…] weekend I took my son to the Hometown Celebrity Softball Challenge here in Indianapolis. I wrote about the event here and who attended, but wanted to share a bit of a personal story about our experience with the […]