Noon Exchange holds annual Mayfest 5K Color Run

By BRITTANY FHOLER

Cove Leader-Press

The Copperas Cove Noon Exchange Club held its annual Mayfest 5K Color Run Saturday morning at Ogletree Gap, drawing out 25 runners and walkers. 

The run serves as the primary fundraiser for the Noon Exchange Club each year. The funds that are raised through this run are then redistributed back into the community to different organizations that are “on the front lines of child abuse prevention”, such as AWARE Central Texas, Hope Pregnancy Center, Communities in Schools, Cove House Emergency Shelter and more, according to Brian Hawkins, with the Noon Exchange Club. 

The club will decide next month how much will be distributed to the different organizations at their annual banquet to be held June 30, he added. 

Although the number of people who came out on a warm, humid morning was small, Hawkins said that the club really appreciated each runner. 

“We’re not on the CenTex Race Series, so this is an extra race that they come out and do, so we appreciate every participant that comes out and does it on a day like today with the humidity as high as it is,” Hawkins said. “It’s a tough run, especially up that hill, but they come out and battle it out with us, so we really appreciate them coming to be part of it.”

Adriana Hernandez said this was her first time at the Mayfest 5K Color Run.

“I’ve done this route before, so it’s a good route,” Hernandez said. “It’s just that hill is always a killer going up but coming down is fine.”

She said she thought that the race serving as a fundraiser for child abuse prevention was a great idea. 

As an employee with the city, Hernandez said she also earns points participating in various races through the city’s Cove Fit program and called the points earned from Saturday’s race her “hard earned five points.”

This year was also the first time for April Salido for both the race and running a 5K. She found out about the run through her aunt and cousin. Her younger cousin ran the race with his friends, so Salido signed up to support him, she said. She found out about the run last Wednesday and signed up the day before the race.

“I was like, ‘Yeah, let’s do it,’” Salido said. “I’ve always wanted to do one, and so I just signed up yesterday around noon.”

The course was difficult, she said, especially with the hills. There is one really steep hill that participants had to overcome, she said.

“I just want to like crawl up there, bear crawl because it was so much, but then it made up for it because there was a downhill over here, so I ran down,” Salido said.

Salido said that being able to help support child abuse prevention just by running was something not to take for granted. 

“To me, it’s an honor to be able to do stuff like this in this country, you know,” Salido said. “Because in other countries, these things aren’t really brought up or even cared about so for our community to be able to do something like this, I think it’s really cool. I didn’t even know we did anything like this.”

The top five finishers included Mateo Sobers, 16, and B. Boyer, 12, both with a clock time of 25:34.7; Eden Carter, 13, with a clock time of 25:40.4; Keith Fields, 30, with a clock time of 29:48.3; and B. Andrews, 12, with a clock time of 38:21.2. The top female participant was Adriana Hernandez, who finished with a clock time of 39:19.2. 

The Noon Exchange Club meets the second and fourth Fridays of every month at 12 p.m. at Lil-Tex Restaurant.