This year MS Research Australia launched a new Kiss Goodbye to MS initiative – The May 50K!
The May 50K is a virtual fitness and fundraising challenge developed to encourage more people to get involved in raising funds for life changing MS research.
The MS community, their family, friends and colleagues were encouraged to get active and run or walk 50 kilometres in the month of May to help leave MS where it belongs, behind us. Over 9,200 participants signed up to take part, putting in love, sweat and tears to log a monumental 474,575 kilometres. The result of this incredible effort? A record-breaking $2.1 million raised for MS research!
The virtual nature of the challenge set The May 50K apart from other events, as well as the unique flexibility it offered to ensure anyone that wanted to could take part regardless of their physical ability. Although most participants chose to walk or run, the challenge was also inclusive and adaptable for those with mobility limitations to scale the distance down or up, or to modify their preferred approach.
The May 50K is a huge part of taking the Kiss Goodbye to MS campaign to the next level. Initially established to raise awareness back in 2012, Kiss Goodbye to MS has expanded internationally and been warmly embraced by 13 countries. It is the only campaign dedicated to globally increasing awareness and, in recent years, also raising vital funds for MS research.
In previous years Kiss Goodbye to MS operated as a successful “do-it-yourself” style fundraising campaign, where supporters created their own ideas of how they wanted to fundraise. This attracted some of our most creative and unique fundraising events including horse rides, car rallies, sky dives and gala balls. The Red Lab Coat Day – whereby researchers wear red lab coats and put together videos to showcase their MS research, culminating in a Battle of the Labs winner – has also been a fantastic way of raising awareness and funds within the research community. Now, the exciting addition of The May 50K has made 2019 our biggest year yet…and we’re only half way through!
The support for the MS research cause has been and continues to be, awe-inspiring showing what a special, determined and supportive community there is in Australia. A huge thank you to
everyone that took on The May 50K and we can wholeheartedly say that with more funding, it’s not a matter of ‘if’, it’s a matter of ‘when’ we will Kiss Goodbye to MS. Find out more at:
kissgoodbyetoms.org.
