About Team Iowa

Team Iowa cel­e­brates the gifts of organ, eye and tis­sue dona­tion and encour­ages oth­ers to reg­is­ter as a donor. By com­pet­ing in the Trans­plant Games of Amer­i­ca (TGA) we hon­or our donors, our donor fam­i­lies and cel­e­brate life. The team con­sists of ath­letes and sup­port mem­bers who par­tic­i­pate in var­i­ous events at the Trans­plant Games of Amer­i­ca. Our ath­letes have received an organ, bone mar­row, tis­sue or corneal trans­plant or are a liv­ing donor. We are always thrilled to wel­come new team mem­bers and would love to have more peo­ple join our fam­i­ly for the next Trans­plant Games in Den­ver, Colorado!

About the Trans­plant Games of Amer­i­ca:

TGA occurs every oth­er sum­mer and is both a cel­e­bra­tion of life and a way to hon­or the extra­or­di­nary gen­eros­i­ty of donors and their fam­i­lies. Team Iowa is com­prised of men, women and chil­dren from the trans­plant com­mu­ni­ty who want to spread aware­ness about organ, eye and tis­sue donation. 

Through­out the games, trans­plant recip­i­ents com­pete with oth­er recip­i­ents from across the coun­try in Olympic-style ath­let­ic events. In addi­tion to the com­pe­ti­tions, there are many events for donor fam­i­ly mem­bers, includ­ing the Open­ing Cer­e­monies, the Donor Trib­ute, 5K Walk/​Run, Triv­ia and oth­er Donor Fam­i­ly events. Join us to cel­e­brate, com­pete, and com­mem­o­rate.

Com­pe­ti­tions at the Trans­plant Games of America:

Par­tic­i­pa­tion:

To par­tic­i­pate as an ath­lete in the Games you must meet the fol­low­ing requirements:

• Have received an organ, tis­sue, bone mar­row or cornea trans­plant (regard­less if you are tak­ing anti-rejec­tion med­ica­tion or not) or you are a liv­ing donor.
• Trans­plant occurred at least 9 months pri­or to the start of the Games.
• You are in healthy con­di­tion and your doc­tor has signed a med­ical waiv­er allow­ing you to participate.
• You have signed a form stat­ing that you meet the above requirements.
• You have com­plet­ed an appli­ca­tion form and back­ground screening.

Sup­port Team Mem­bers include:

• Fam­i­ly mem­bers and friends of the athletes
• Donor Fam­i­lies
• Trans­plant or Organ Pro­cure­ment Orga­ni­za­tion professionals
• Oth­er inter­est­ed indi­vid­u­als who wish to sup­port the team

Gen­er­al Respon­si­bil­i­ties of a Team Iowa mem­ber are:

• Fill out a mem­ber­ship appli­ca­tion and pro­vide infor­ma­tion to com­plete a back­ground screening.
• Fill out an indi­vid­ual pro­file form to share your sto­ry in the Team Iowa Directory.
• Secure spon­sor­ship and funds for Team Iowa ($750.00 min­i­mum goal per ath­lete). Fundrais­ing pro­vides fund­ing for con­tin­u­ing the mis­sion of Team Iowa and helps off­set the costs of attend­ing the Games.
• Vol­un­teer at Team Iowa and com­mu­ni­ty events lead­ing up to the Games. 
• Share your per­son­al sto­ry with your com­mu­ni­ty to encour­age sup­port for dona­tion and trans­plan­ta­tion and to increase the num­ber of those who reg­is­ter as a donor.
• Cheer on and sup­port fel­low team­mates at the Trans­plant Games!

Team Iowa is orga­nized and sup­port­ed by Iowa Donor Net­work. Please con­tact team man­ag­er, Anna War­den­burg, if you would like to get involved.

Spon­sor­ship Opportunities:

Your finan­cial gift pro­vides crit­i­cal edu­ca­tion about organ, eye and tis­sue dona­tion in our com­mu­ni­ty and sup­ports Team Iowa’s par­tic­i­pa­tion in the Games. The trag­ic real­i­ty remains that there are many more peo­ple wait­ing for trans­plants than there are organs avail­able. By pro­vid­ing edu­ca­tion about organ, eye and tis­sue dona­tion and cel­e­brat­ing the life-sav­ing and life-restor­ing ben­e­fits of trans­plan­ta­tion, we are able to increase pub­lic support.

Your con­tri­bu­tion guar­an­tees your oppor­tu­ni­ty to be includ­ed in all pro­mo­tion­al mate­ri­als, includ­ing our web­site and team shirt. The spon­sor­ship lev­els must be con­firmed by March 31, 2026.

Vis­it Iowa Donor Net­work’s Spon­sor­ship page to learn more about this opportunity.

2026 Team Sponsors:

Bronze

Advo­cate

Nom­i­nate a Donor Fam­i­ly to Attend the Trans­plant Games:

Team Iowa is proud to spon­sor one donor fam­i­ly from Iowa to attend the 2026 Trans­plant Games of Amer­i­ca (TGA) in Den­ver, Col­orado from June 18-June 23, 2026. TGA is a won­der­ful oppor­tu­ni­ty for donor fam­i­lies to meet oth­er fam­i­lies who have made the deci­sion to donate life and to wit­ness recip­i­ents who are now thriv­ing thanks to the gifts they’ve received. Many donor fam­i­lies who attended have shared how heal­ing and inspir­ing the expe­ri­ence has been for them. From shar­ing their loved one’s sto­ry, meet­ing oth­ers who have expe­ri­enced a sim­i­lar loss and wit­ness­ing the appre­ci­a­tion of trans­plant recip­i­ents, donor fam­i­lies find TGA to be an unfor­get­table expe­ri­ence they will nev­er for­get.

Through the open appli­ca­tion process, indi­vid­u­als may nom­i­nate a fam­i­ly to par­tic­i­pate or a fam­i­ly may direct­ly apply. A Donor Fam­i­ly Nom­i­na­tion/Appli­ca­tion must be filled out for con­sid­er­a­tion.

Please note that we wel­come all fam­i­lies inter­est­ed in par­tic­i­pat­ing in the Games. While we are only able to finan­cial­ly sup­port one family’s par­tic­i­pa­tion, all fam­i­lies are invit­ed to join the team and par­tic­i­pate at their own expense. Fam­i­lies who have pre­vi­ous­ly been spon­sored by IDN/​Team Iowa to attend either TGA or the Rose Parade are not eli­gi­ble for spon­sor­ship, but are invit­ed to join the team. Excep­tions will be con­sid­ered if there is an extra­or­di­nary sto­ry to be told by a unique prospec­tive par­tic­i­pant. To learn more about Team Iowa and TGA, please vis­it the team web­site at IowaDonor­Net­work.org/TeamIowa.

The 2026 spon­sored Donor Fam­i­ly has been select­ed. For any ques­tions or inquiries please con­tact:
Anna War­den­burg, Team Man­ag­er
E: awardenburg@​iadn.​org
P: 319.631.7436