Pink power: 5,000 gather to fight breast cancer in annual walk
WEST PALM BEACH — A crowd clad in pink gathered downtown Saturday to help raise money to fight breast cancer, and their fundraising efforts are outpacing last year’s.
The Susan G. Komen nonprofit held its “More Than Pink” walk along Flagler Drive that morning, starting with warm-up cardio exercises, followed by speeches from breast cancer survivors, before attendees walked, jogged or ran up and down Flagler Drive.
About 5,000 people gathered before 8:30 a.m. on the lawn of the Meyer Amphitheatre. An emcee on the stage led the crowd in arm stretches, squats and other warm-up exercises.
After that, WPTV NewsChannel 5’s Shannon Cake hyped up the crowd and introduced breast cancer survivors to speak. One of them, Kelly Seitz, quoted the actor Chevy Chase’s character from the movie “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.”
“Whenever anyone asks how much of a shock it must have been for a perfectly healthy, super-athletic 20-year-old with no family history to have been diagnosed with a rare and aggressive triple-negative breast cancer,” Seitz said. “I often cite the great Clark W. Griswold: ‘If I woke up tomorrow with my head sewn to the carpet, I'd be more surprised.’” The crowd clapped and laughed in response.
Survivors also were invited to the front of the crowd, and received a mass salute from walkers who took off their caps and twirled them above their heads.
The annual walk raised more than $394,000 as of Saturday afternoon, more than it reported the morning of the 2023 walk.
New sponsors for the walk helped push its fundraising past last year’s. Business backers included Rivera Beach-based Tropical Shipping and the South Florida Ford Dealers group. Mainstay sponsors included Florida Power & Light, Publix and the University of Miami Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Tropical Shipping raised the most for the West Palm Beach walk, bringing in $12,250, Komen’s website reported Saturday, followed by FPL with about $12,000, and Publix with more than $8,500.
Jessica Patykula, lead organizer for the walk, was so far the biggest individual fundraiser, with almost $21,000, followed by Lisa Chauhan with about $14,000, and Tracy Cooper at about $5,400.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: West Palm Beach's Komen walk draws 5,000, raises $400K
