Prince George, B.C. – You may have noticed a proliferation of pink around the city during the course of this week and rightly so as this is Paint Canada Pink Week, which raises awareness about breast cancer and promotes registration and fundraising for the CIBC Run for the Cure in October.

The Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation has been hosting events across the country in the countdown to the Run for the Cure on Sunday, October 5th.  Shari MacLellan handles communications and promotions for the local branch and says “69 communities are celebrating the kickoff to the run in different ways.  Here in Prince George we’re doing the Store Front Challenge which involves Crystal Glass, Prince George Motors and both Chatters salons.  They have their storefronts decorated pink, and how they’ll be judged is people can go in a make a donation to their store and the donations will go to the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation and the store with the highest amount of donations will be our winner.”

MacLellan says “we’ll also be at the Farmer’s Market today (Saturday) promoting the event and encouraging registrations.  And on Sunday we are doing an Amazing Race.  There are teams signed up and they’ll be starting at City Hall at 11 o’clock and they’ll be racing” to various locations around town.  “There will be prizes for the team that comes in first, and a prize for most unique costume and things like that.  So we will be racing all over Prince George and promoting the Run.”

“I believe there are four stops that the runners will have to make and there will be challenges at each stop and of course promoting breast health.  So they’ll have to answer questions about breast health information and then they’ll get the next clue to go to the next stop.  At the end we will be having a barbecue.  Mr Mike’s is sponsoring our barbecue for a $5 donation.”

Last year Prince George raised $80,786 through the Run for the Cure.  MacLellan says there is no set fundraising goal this year, adding “of course we’d love to surpass that, but the real goal is every dollar going towards breast cancer research and education and these awareness programs is important, so we appreciate every dollar that’s raised.”

Anyone, whether taking part in an actual fundraising event or not, can contribute to the battle against breast cancer by visiting www.cibcrunforthecure.com