A 5K in April organized by a young Witt resident will benefit Make-A-Wish Illinois. Ten-year-old Lauren Hartman's cousin went on a Make-A-Wish trip to Disney before he passed away in 2014. Lauren says she wanted to donate money to the organization in memory of her cousin and decided to use her love of running to raise money.

We did the Hillsboro Runner's Club Turkey Trot and I thought it would be fun to just do my own and to help out Make-A-Wish and all those companies that help other people.

Lauren says the race is called the Half Witt 5k because, You have to run half of Witt just to get 3.1 miles.

Lauren's mother, Jody Hartman, says the 5K was all Lauren's idea.

She came up with a great idea (and) we worked together to make it fun. One of the things she has talked about is, she's won a couple medals in her age group, she's won a couple first places and she said it doesn't really matter about the medals, but she wants everybody to feel involved in the whole race - whether you're first, whether you're last - so she was very adamant about everyone (getting) a finisher's medal.

The Half Witt 5K begins at 9am on Saturday, April 2nd, at the Witt Lions Building. Sign up sheets can be found at Fusion Fitness and Aquatics in Hillsboro, the Security National Bank of Witt and the Journal-News in Hillsboro. You can also find the Half Witt 5k on Facebook and register online here: RunSignUp. Registering by March 12th guarantees participants receive a Finisher's Medal and T-shirt.
Lauren and Jody Hartman were the guests on this weekend's Around Montgomery County program. You can find the full interview here: AMC

Thomack 1/18/16