Registration for the first in-person run in three years opens Friday, April 29…
By Jumol Royes
On your mark, get set, go!
Toronto’s pride & remembrance run is returning to the streets of Church-Wellesley Village for the first time since 2019. The 26th annual run is scheduled to take place on the morning of Saturday, June 25, 2022.
Participants will have the option to do an in-person 5km run or 3km walk, or to join the virtual race from wherever they happen to be.
“As our community emerges from the COVID-19 pandemic, we’re thrilled to once again host Canada’s LGBTQ2+ community and its allies for a family-friendly athletic event during the final weekend of Toronto’s world-renowned Pride Month,” said Alain Belaiche, founder of the pride & remembrance run.
This year’s race promises to be fun (think drag queens, DJs, rainbows and bubble machines!), fast (feel free to run, walk or roll at your own pace), fab (it’s the only athletic event held during Pride Month), welcoming and inclusive (that means new runners, walkers and kids are welcome, too), community-driven and diverse. A new “Friends of the Run” program will feature prominent LGBTQ2+ Canadians helping to put a spotlight on the run and its beneficiaries.
The Hon. Kathleen Wynne, Ontario’s first female and openly gay premier, the Hon. Scott Brison, vice-chair of BMO Capital Markets and Canada’s first openly gay federal cabinet minister, Tynomi Banks, one of Toronto’s most famous and in-demand drag queens, Bill Coulter, CP24 media personality and Devon Heroux, CBC News, Sports and Olympics personality, are among the inaugural “Friends of the Run” ambassadors.
Beneficiaries for the 2022 run include the AIDS Committee of Toronto, Fife House, Gilbert Centre, Rainbow Railroad and the Pride and Remembrance Foundation.
Founded in 1996 in the aftermath of the AIDS crisis, the run honours twin themes of pride and remembrance and has raised over $2.1 million benefitting more than two dozen LGBTQ2+ community organizations.
Registration for this year’s pride & remembrance run opens at 11:05 a.m. ET on Friday, April 29.
Visit the newly relaunched website at www.priderun.org to learn more.
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JUMOL ROYES is IN Magazine’s director of communications and community engagement, a GTA-based storyteller and glass-half-full kinda guy. He writes about compassion, community, identity and belonging. His guilty pleasure is watching the Real Housewives. Follow him on Twitter @Jumol and on Instagram @jumolroyes.
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