By STEVE BUFFERY -- Toronto Sun
  Canadian track and field officials were going crazy waiting for the loonies to come in, so they gladly grabbed the greenbacks.

 A Chicago-area businessman has made a $10,000 US donation to the Canadian track and field team, and offered a further $5,000 down the road to help athletes on this side of the border prepare for the Sydney Olympics.

 The team's head coach, Brent McFarlane, said he hoped the donation would shame Canadian businesses into opening their hearts and wallets.

 "It should be appalling to each and every Canadian citizen that an American businessman wrote a cheque for $10,000 US in a university parking lot because he saw a need for Canadian athletes to have a fair chance to prepare and compete at the Olympics," McFarlane said.

 For two years, McFarlane has worked to solicit donations from the Canadian public, corporations and team alumni. The results have been pathetic. After sending out 800 pledge cards and 1,000 e-mails, McFarlane said the team got a handful of donations, the biggest worth about $800 Cdn.

 But then came a white knight wearing red, white and blue. McFarlane was recently in Naperville, Ill., training the hockey-playing son of Mark McIlvane, senior vice-president of Chicago communications firm Clarent Corporation.

 Over lunch, McFarlane explained the Canadian team's need for funds to prepare the athletes for Sydney. The coach's budget for pre-Olympic preparation has dropped in the past few months to $111,000 from $200,000. And with the donations coming in slower than Wendel Clark on a breakaway, the Waterloo-based coach was getting desperate.

 Then McIlvane, a former NCAA wrestler, offered to help, to the tune of what could amount to more than $23,000 Cdn.

 "I personally feel and believe that all athletes should have a fair opportunity to represent their country and be able to do their best," McIlvane said.

 Athletics Canada officials are hoping McIlvane's donation spurs support from red-faced Canadians.

 "I hope it does happen," AC president John Thresher said. "I hope I get dozens of calls (today) for support. But I'm not holding my breath."