Wild Tomorrow’s team of 15 charity runners ran 13.1 miles to complete the 2023 United Airlines NYC Half marathon in New York City this Sunday, March 19th. Each runner was committed to raising at least $1,000 in support of our work protecting and restoring habitat for elephants and other species who share their wild spaces. Read more about “Team Elephant”, why they’re running to help elephants, and our event photo gallery in our latest blog below.

*Team Elephant runners Sanah Budhraja, Wendy Hapgood, Sabena Jain and Roshni Jain at the finish line.*

On Sunday, our team of 15 Team Elephant runners joined a herd of almost 25,000 people on a runner’s mass migration from Brooklyn to Central Park in New York City, to complete the 2023 United Airlines NYC Half marathon!

It was an unseasonably cold day with temperatures below freezing and an icy wind chill making it ‘feel like’ -8C/18F, but our runners would not be deterred! They ran with full hearts, committed to protecting elephants and African wildlife in support of Wild Tomorrow.

The race’s professional runners were blazing fast at the front, with African runners firmly in the lead. Helen Obiri from Kenya ran an amazing 1.07.21 race as the fastest pro female, with Jacob Kiplimo from Uganda winning the pro men’s race at 1.01.31. On our animal-loving team, Dave Mancuso finished with a speedy 1.54.52 as our fastest male runner, and Clarisse Taboy was not far behind running 2.09.30! Our leading fundraiser was Linda Hapgood, raising $1,454 total thanks to matching donations from her employer Boeing.

All together our awesome Team Elephant raised an amazing $16,571 (and climbing) thanks to their half-marathon efforts! You can help them in their efforts by donating below.

DONATE TO TEAM ELEPHANT

Each runner first must send in a written application for a coveted spot in our team for both the half and full NYC marathons. It’s moving to read their reasons to run for elephants and wildlife conservation.

Clarisse Taboy used her race to raise awareness of the impact of consumption on our planet, ”I especially am passionate about sustainability and responsible consumption/disposal, since our everyday actions and demands as humans ultimately impact the earth and its biodiversity” she said. “I want to help raise awareness about how to be more environmentally conscious and to think beyond the good of the human species.”

It was Dave Mancuso’s father, a high school life sciences teacher, who instilled in him the desire to leave behind a more sustainable planet. “As climate change becomes an increasingly hot topic in the political landscape, now is the time to draw attention to the importance of habitat preservation and the destructive impact humans have on the environment” said Dave.

De’Andra Wizzart has worked up close with wildlife in the US, working at several AZA-accredited locations including with African animals at Disney’s Animal Kingdom in Florida. “I want to make sure the people doing conservation efforts to protect them have the help they need” said De’Andra who was the first runner to speed past the $1000 minimum fundraising goal. She’s hoping to see elephants in their wild habitat one day soon, hopefully on a Wild Tomorrow volunteer trip next year!

*Jithamanyu ready to begin, on the subway to Brooklyn to start the race.*

Jithamanyu Thoppey Muralidharan is a graduate student at Columbia University’s Sustainability Management Program. Jithamanyu grew up near the rainforests in South India, where he lived close to several national parks and wildlife sanctuaries. He used his race to raise awareness of the plight of both African and Asian elephants. While African elephant populations have declined from 4,000,000 some 50 years ago to ~415,000 currently, only ~40,000 Asian elephants remain in the wild today.

Sanah Budhraja is also from India, from the state of Kerala, a place known for its love of elephants. She has travelled to help support elephant sanctuaries in India and Thailand, and we hope she’ll join us in the field in South Africa as her next elephant-focused trip! Her friend Sabena Jain ran with her, and said “Saving wildlife is very dear to my heart, especially elephants. If I can contribute to helping even one animal, that would be very special”, together with her aunt Roshni Jain. What an amazing family effort for elephants.

We had another family of elephant lovers run for us this year, with Alexandra Jeronimo and her 16-year old son Perez Jeronimo flying in to run from the Dominican Republic. Perez is the first young adult to run in the NYC half for Team Elephant and did a great job setting up his fundraising page and reaching out to friends for support. As a family they listened together to the audio book When Elephants Weep about the inner emotional lives of animals, and the need for more compassion. Alexandra said they “came to have the most intense affinity for elephants and their wisdom, depth, and long relationship with this world. Their lives are in imminent danger with the loss of territory and climate collapse and we want to do our part, however small, to help.” Thank you to the kind, elephant-loving Jeronimo family!

Conservationists joined the ranks of team elephant this year. Marcelina Martynek is a scientist working on her PhD at the University of Pennsylvania, studying the effects of climate change on coral reef ecosystems. She has a deep love of the natural world and her hobby is running. The race meant she could combine both passions, running to save the habitat for the species she cares so strongly about.

Wendy Hapgood, co-founder of Wild Tomorrow Fund, ran again with the team this year, together with her twin sister Linda Hapgood. Wendy ran to support the team, her work at Wild Tomorrow, and as a special twin moment in NYC. Both sisters are animal lovers, born in Australia surrounded by wild birds and nature. “The sheer loss of nature around the world is depressing, but as Greta Thunberg says, hope comes from action. It’s deeply meaningful to take action physically to save wildlife and wild places, putting lots of training and effort into supporting wildlife conservation alongside financial donations. I’m so proud of our Team Elephant!” said Wendy.

Alix Cross flew in from Nashville to run the race with her friend, supporting the protection of wildlife and their habitat, and Adam Hundley, based in Boston as a lawyer and life-long animal lover, told us that Wild Tomorrow’s mission to save and protect habitat really resonated with him personally. Jessie Wallace is vegan and ran for her love of all animals, speeding plant-powered to the finish line.

Congratulations and trunks-up to our 2023 United NYC Half marathon team this year. The entire Wild Tomorrow team is so grateful for your efforts, running in the cold, for a challenging half-marathon race dedicated to protecting wildlife.

We send extra special thanks to our Ambassador, Nadja Rutkowski who volunteered to photograph the runners this year, a particularly demanding day photographing in the very cold weather! Check out some of our runners in action below.

TEAM ELEPHANT RUNS THE 2023 UNITED AIRLINES NYC HALF