Here at Tremblant’s 24h, we’re always on the lookout for feel-good stories. And with hundreds of teams registered for this year’s edition, all working on behalf of children’s causes, we have no shortage of material!  This year, we’ve got an inspiring story that stands out from the rest: children who’ve decided to get involved in helping other children.

 How survival bracelets got their start

It all began when the Arsenault family spent a year living on a sailboat. Brothers Isaac and Gabriel learned how to make the famous paracord survival bracelets, practicing the various knots with a family friend. The idea behind the bracelet is that it’s practical to always have a piece of rope on your person for use in an emergency. Not to mention, the bracelets make a good-looking fashion accessory.

When the brothers were assigned a project for school (yes, they were still studying while on their parents’ boat!), they decided to sell bracelets and donate the profits to a good cause.

Rallying friends to the cause

Coming from a highly motivated lineage of 24h participants, the choice was obvious for the two young men who’ve experienced the 24h as a family activity for several years. And thus the Descendants de Ski Morin-Heights (SMH) team came to be!

Back on dry land, a fired-up Isaac immediately began to recruit friends for a ski team that would combine love of a sport (skiing) with a good cause (Tremblant’s 24h). The result: Zorak, Nicola, Alice, Léa, Emma-Rose, Tyler, Félix, William, Anne-Sophie, Estelle and Emerick, all high school students, are now devoting heart and soul to collecting donations for other kids. On top of practicing for their competitive ski season, they are training intensively for their first 24 consecutive hours of sport! Gabriel, who’s too young to participate, is still helping to make bracelets and is waiting impatiently for the day he can sign up for the event.

All together for Deyrek

It only takes a few minutes chatting with the Descendants de SMH to be infected by their enthusiasm. We were able to meet them at the event launch last October. They even contacted us in advance to ensure they would be able to spend time with their team’s sponsored child, Deyrek (Fondation Tremblant). With almost all of these kids native to the Laurentians, they are determined to go the extra mile for the youth who hails from their region. They even asked a friend’s dad, a firefighter, if he could invite Deyrek to spend a day at the station, since being a firefighter has been Deyrek’s dream since he was very young.

What started as a school project with the goal of raising $1,200 for a cause has snowballed beyond everyone’s wildest dreams. In fact, after selling many bracelets and holding numerous fundraising activities, the team has already surpassed their initial total tenfold, raising a whopping $13,000 in donations for Tremblant’s 24h!

Cover photo: Les Descendants de SMH with the team’s sponsored child, Deyrek.