It’s Coming
Thanksgiving is a little more than 2 months away. Hardly anyone is thinking about it at this point. But we are. Turkey Trot is now nearly a decade old. But really only on its 3rd year of being an event with a purpose besides a bunch of friends getting together to run in the cold on Thanksgiving Morning. Now its much more – a chance to help others and give.
Not very many events (anywhere) make it their goal to give 100% away. (We only know of one other – Race For The Homeless in August out at Marine Park.) For the last two years, Turkey Trot has been able to offset ALL race expenses with donations. That means that everything people paid/donated to race went straight to the Principal’s Checkbook program to help kids. We like that. There are a lot of expenses to put on a race: park permit, signage, insurance, food, timing costs, awards, etc. It really adds up. (Way to go those of you who donated!)
One more thing that makes this race unique is that it actually costs NOTHING to participate. Really. Just show up on race day. Put on your shoes and get out there and do the 5K or 10K. We’ll treat you with respect, report your time, count you as a winner. But if you can give, do give. And if you are able to give the minimum of $15, we’ll even set you up with a race T-shirt plus whatever else we can obtain from local sponsors. But don’t stop at $15. Give more. You are directly helping kids in our schools. The money (all of it) goes straight to the school targeting the truly underprivileged. Nobody takes a cut and makes something. Just the kids. So, give $20 or $30 or whatever you can. If you don’t have it, come out and race anyhow. We are glad to just see you on Thanksgiving Morning!
Organized Chaos!
There is less than one week to go until the running of the 2009 Turkey Trot here in Clark County, WA. Things are coming together nicely. Yesterday a really dedicated group of people over at First Independent Bank stuffed 500 bags with a bunch of really nice stuff (hat, mug, more) in preparation for the race. Every few minutes, someone else signs up for the race and it looks like we might hit our 500 racer maximum. Others are busy buying donuts, getting ready to brew coffee, find space heaters, gather the start/finish banners and more. It’s actually a lot of fun.
We have had a number of businesses and other sponsors in our area step up and really make a meaningful contribution. It is encouraging to know there are so many out there who care about helping others. In no particular order, here’s who we appreciate:
*First Independent Bank (Presenting Sponsor)
*Firstenburg Family Foundation
*New Heights Church
*Almega Door
*Workplace Resource of Oregon
*Fred Meyer
*Winco Foods
*Boyds Coffee
*Fit Right Northwest
*Yogi
*Applied Motion Systems
*House of Magnets
*Graphic Business Solutions
*Garrett Sign
*Schlecht Construction
These are just companies and organizations, but it is the people behind them all that actually make it all work. Way to go!
First it was Beanies, Now it is T-shirts
2008 was the 7th annual Turkey Trot. But, it was the first year that any giveaways were provided — a cool black knit beanie with the TT logo embroidered on the front. Lot’s of people liked them. But not everyone. This year we are going with T-shirts. Dark chocolate with color printing on the front and the back. They come in 7 sizes (Kids S, M, L; Adult S, M, L, XL). Tell us what you like best. Comments and feedback wanted.
Thanks to Many
The Turkey Trot is a VERY unusual race. It raises money for a charity. That’s not so unusual. It gives 100% of the money collected directly to charity. That is pretty unusual. It requires no mandatory fee to participate. That’s unusual too. How’s it do this? By having generous sponsors: First Independent Bank, the Firstenburg Family Foundation, the New Heights Foundation, plus some kind individuals. Lot’s to be thankful for this Thanksgiving.
Behind The Scenes
A lot of what it takes to make the Turkey Trot (or an race event) work is what happens “behind the scenes.” And we have been busy at work on this kind of stuff during the last several weeks: making sure registration works for all people, making the process compatible with any web browser out there, collecting the database of information from those who register or give, finding the least expensive way to manage the PayPal account so expenses stay super low, etc. This is the stuff that most of you will never see, but thanks to a team of 100% volunteers, it all comes together beautifully!
Website is just a few days away!
Although the Turkey Trot 2009 website has existed for over a month now (thanks to the great students at WSU Vancouver), it is just a few days away from going 100% live with registration and all the other elements being active and ready to work. Our goal was to have everything ready by October 1, but it looks like we will beat that by several days. Good news! And, thanks to all who have worked hard to make this coming year’s Turkey Trot something pretty special.
