MOUNT VERNON — The Food for the Hungry Drive received the support of 188 participants and eight volunteers on Thursday morning at the second annual Mount Vernon Running Buddies Turkey Trot 5K, which was held on the campus of Mount Vernon Nazarene University.
The event, which more than doubled in size from last year’s inaugural event with 76 participants, drew walkers and runners from eight different states ranging in age from 3 to 67. They combined to donate $539 and 530 non-perishable food items to the Food for the Hungry Drive, which will be contributed through MVNU’s Feed 920 Initiative. Both totals were triple what came in during the previous year’s race.
Christian Hill, 18, of Mount Vernon won the race with a time of 20:01 as he easily outdistanced the rest of the field. Donald Cobb, 40, of Fredericktown was second in 21:32, while Jonathan Foster, 21, of Rochester, N.Y. was third in 21:47. Beth Loffredo, 43, of Sleepy Hollow, N.Y. was the top female finisher as she finished seventh overall in 23:24 to knock three seconds off the previous record in the event set by Tricia Pokosh, 39, of Mount Vernon, who was the female runner up this time in 23:44.
