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Sufferfest hosts volunteer drive

Neufeld, along with other supporters, were recruiting volunteers in the Seniors Centre to assist with the operation.

Sufferfest organizer, Janis Neufeld, opened up the doors to the Nakusp Seniors Centre on Thursday evening and enticed visitors with her bright red, finish/start inflatable arch to drop in.

Neufeld, along with other supporters, were recruiting volunteers in the Seniors Centre to assist with the operation of the Nakusp leg of the three-day Sufferfest event scheduled for September 1. Tasks such as set-up, clean-up, gear transport and marshalling are all essential to the successful operation of the fitness-orientated event and require the support of the community.

Neufeld has broken up the monumental task of running Sufferfest into groups assigned specific tasks and managed by individual team captains.

“I can’t train everyone who volunteered to be a marshal,” Neufeld explains “but I can train the captain who in turn will train their crew.”

Sufferfest requires approximately 75 volunteers from Nakusp to help run the event from start to finish. Neufeld will be running a similar drive with the same numbers goal in New Denver. This will be the first year that Sufferfest will take place in locations outside of its epicentre in Kaslo, where in the past Neufeld has amassed over 200 volunteers from the community of the event’s inception.

Volunteers are essential as Sufferfest, unlike other similar events, is a completely non-profit organization that is committed to seeing the development of the local economy.

“We have something very special here,” Neufeld asserts. “We are an organization that serves the community with an event made possible by community members. One of our mandates is to support the local economy and part of that is it being volunteer run.”

If you missed the drive and are interested in helping out there is still lots of time. Please contact Janis Neufeld either by phone at 250-265-8707 or by email at janeuf@ymail.com.