Our first ever 5K fundraiser was a blast. Big, big thank you to volunteers April Graham and Laura Heggs for organizing the Ellensburg event – you did a terrific job! After expenses, the event raised $5,530 for the sanctuary!

Here are a few photos to prove how much fun it was:

Volunteers Seana (who was also the raffle sponsor), Connie and Emily working on registration under race organizer April’s direction, with our new Director of Development, Michael, looking on:

The start of the great chalk messaging courtesy of volunteer Stephanie:

Board member Jessica (right) and partner Lisa donned tutus in honor of Jamie:

Race organizer April of AlignFit leading a stretching class prior to the start of the run:

the runners approaching the start line:

and they’re off!

About 15 minutes later, the “troll strollers” (walkers) began:

in just 21 minutes, 37 seconds, the first runner, Kurtis, crossed the finish line:

two minutes, eight seconds later, the fastest woman in the race, Keri, crossed the finish:

Event organizer Laura Heggs, running to the finish after clearing up some signs from the course:

One of the glitter-bombed “trollphy” awards:

This is just a small sampling of the photos from the event. Visit the full gallery and purchase your favorites – proceeds from sales go to the chimps!

Thanks to sponsors Gorilla Screen Printing for the discount on the great t-shirts, Zing Bars for delicious post-running nutrition (the coconut chocolate bars are amaZING!) and AlignFit for the stretching class. Individual donors, like Ape Ally Adrienne Armstrong, made a huge difference in the success of the fundraiser. See all sponsors and donors  here.

Our volunteers are always top-notch and dove right in to the new event.

And the participants were terrific!

We can’t wait to do it again!