The IHelp foundation was first founded in 2003 by Bill Betz and Brent Skinner when the two of them loaded a van with medical equipment, clothes and first-aid supplies and traveled from Logan to San Salvador, El Salvador to help after a mudslide had hit the country.
The foundation has grown and they now have a free clinic to serve people in Cache Valley. They also visit and serve people in Uganda, Liberia and Guatemala.
Taylor Mendenhall, a graduate of Utah State University and the executive director of student affairs at IHelp explained more about the impact of the foundation.
“We live in a world where, especially in America, where we have things at our fingertips; we have everything that we could possibly hope for," Mendenhall said. "That's easily accessible. And it's very humbling and eye-opening to be able to go to these developing countries where people have never seen a doctor before,”
As a nonprofit organization, IHelp runs off of donations. In order to fund their community outreach activities and their future trips to other countries, the foundation is holding a race on April 29.
This event has three different races, a one mile, a 5K and a 10K.
Doug Fullmer is the chief operation officer for IHelp. “The 10k — we're going to make the claim that we're the hardest 10k in the state of Utah — is brutal. It's got a 500-foot elevation gain within about a half a mile. So it won't be for the faint of heart. And we get that. It's something that's big and challenging," Fullmer said.
This is the first year the foundation has held a fundraiser like this and Fullmer shared where the idea for the race came from.
Fullmer said, “It was one of our interns at Utah State that said, 'Hey, I got an idea what if we do a 5k, a fundraiser, a fun run for just the community.'"
More information on the race and the foundation can be found at ihelpfoundation.org
