LAKE COMO — Hundreds of racers and community members gathered in the Bar Anticipation parking lot early Saturday morning as they awaited the start of the 7th annual Team Hope Walk and 5k.
With a chill in the air and the sun just peeking through the clouds, members of the Huntington’s Disease Society of America (HDSA) gathered to help organize this event, which is one of their largest fundraisers for the year.
Joe Cosentino, race chair since 2017, said this is his sixth year running the event, and the event had to take a two year hiatus during COVID-19, like so many other events.
He said, “I look forward to this every year. The Team Hope Walk is the flagship banner event for the HDSA organization. It is our primary fundraising vehicle for the organization.”
More than 200 people had registered for the race, which is a significant increase from 2023’s 127 racers. Cosentino said the race has slowly been recouping the numbers that the event used to draw pre-COVID.
The fundraising goal for this event was $37,000, and as of Saturday morning, the event had already made $41,000. Cosentino was confident that over the course of the event the HDSA would make over $45,000 and was hoping for closer to $50,000.
“It’s a pretty solid chunk of money, we are getting to our pre-COVID levels after we took that pause,” said Cosentino.
For more on this story, read the next edition of The Coast Star—on newsstands Thursday or online in our e-Edition.
Check out our other Lake Como stories, updated daily. And remember to pick up a copy of The Coast Star—on newsstands Thursday or online in our e-Edition.
Subscribe today! If you're not already an annual subscriber to The Coast Star, get your subscription today! For just $38 per year, you will receive local mail delivery weekly, with pages and pages of local news and online access to our e-edition on Starnewsgroup.com.