Running to Fundraising

In March, we reach the doldrums for many things...including VT100 fundraising.  It's not quite spring yet, Vermont 100 feels so far away, and by golly it's even challenging to get on the trails these days.  However, using running to fuel your fundraising is a great way to multitask...get yourself out for some training and kick start your spring fundraising.  Below are a few ideas.

(Photo with running friends, because miles are always better with them!)

1. Run for funds.  Organize (or sign up for) a timed run, then see how far you can go.  Have folks pledge based on the number of miles you get in during the timed event.  This will get you out and running some longer miles, and hopefully inspire you to push just a bit harder (to increase the donations).

2. Coordinate a brewery run.  Talk with a local brewery (or pizza joint, or taco place...whatever) and see if they would be willing to donate a set amount of every sale to your fundraising.  Then, get a group of friends to do an easy run followed by beer (or pizza, or tacos).  You get the point...folks want to run, folks want to enjoy some good food/drinks, and folks want to contribute to an amazing cause - this allows you to combine all three!

3. Organize a local race/run (5k or otherwise).  Even if you chose not to do this as a structured/official event, if you organize a circuit for folks to run and ask for donations to participate, folks will come!  In my local community, we do this annually for Movember, and have folks running between 5 miles and 30 miles and typically have 15-30 folks participating.  We've raised several hundred dollars in one day, everyone gets in an awesome run, and it's not heavy lifting to organize.  We don't even mark the course, simply hand out maps to direct folks through the appropriate loops.

(Donation jar at the start/finish of our annual Movember run)

4. Challenge folks through running.  I have done this many times before - had folks donate based on how fast I ran a race.  For example, I wanted to beat 35-minutes in a local 5 mile race so I challenged a friend to donate a quarter for every second below 35 minutes.  Wouldn't you know, I ran that much harder to make him pay and finished around 31 minutes.  He ultimately owed $60 towards my fundraising efforts!

What ideas do you guys have to combine running with fundraising, and to break through the doldrums of late winter/early spring?