More than 850 runners joined the 20th anniversary of the Chinatown 5K on Saturday, undeterred by days of hazardous air quality that caused cancellations of many outdoor events in Chicago.
On Thursday, smoke from Canadian wildfires cloaked the Chicago area in a thick, uncanny haze. Government agencies issued health warnings and urged people to stay indoors. Although conditions improved by Friday afternoon, some parks and venues remained closed.
Race organizers with the Chinatown nonprofit Project: Vision monitored the air quality and weather until early Saturday morning ahead of the 5K’s 8 a.m. start time, followed by a 9 a.m. youth run.
Karen Chiu, founder and executive director for Project: Vision, said organizers “were juggling excitement with close monitoring. The team worked to weigh the risks and benefits of keeping it going versus canceling.”
The race is Project Vision’s biggest fundraiser of the year. As of Saturday, it had raised nearly $35,000 in online donations for underserved Asian American youth in the Chinatown area.
The event costs about $40,000 to organize, so canceling it would have made it hard for the small nonprofit to recoup expenses, Chiu said.
“It was definitely a little stressful,” said Sandy Ruan, Project: Vision’s director of strategic initiatives. “The team worked really hard to address the challenges. I’m glad it worked out.”
Project: Vision supports Asian American youth who are low-income, first- and second-generation immigrants, first in their family to potentially attend college, attend public school and who have academic challenges.
Although Chinatown is among Chicago’s most underserved neighborhoods, its youth are often overlooked due in part to the “model minority” stereotype of Asian Americans, said Chiu last year.
Cindy Liang, a rising senior at Jones College Prep in the South Loop, volunteered at the race on Saturday morning. She has been a Project: Vision member since seventh grade and has joined its after-school tutoring programs.
“It’s a great community space as well. You can reach out to them for help, for academics or anything,” Liang said.
Most Project: Vision youth members live in greater Chinatown, including Armour Square, Bridgeport, McKinley Park, Brighton Park and surrounding neighborhoods.
In Armour Square, which includes Chinatown, nearly 25% of the population lived below the poverty rate in 2024, according to the Institute for Housing Studies at DePaul University.
Jason Lin, 28, won the Chinatown 5K with a time of 17 minutes 23 seconds. He monitored race updates but wasn’t very worried about air quality.
Lin said Chicago’s Chinatown is “an important cultural space,” especially because there wasn’t one where he grew up in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. He donated to Project: Vision and also got his company to match.
Erin Chan Ding lives in South Barrington and has run the Chinatown 5K six times. She recalled running previous races while pushing her toddlers in a stroller. Her kids, now high school students, were at their own track meets Saturday morning.
“It’s such a fun race. You run through the heart of Chinatown and support youth,” she said.
The course included Chinatown Christian Union Church on South Wentworth Avenue, which Chan Ding attended while growing up.
Cheering spectators lining Chinatown’s streets kept her motivated. “When I get tired, I think about all the youths running alongside us,” she said. Although the air cleared up, Saturday’s weather “didn’t take away the humidity,” she laughed. By 9 a.m., it was 84 degrees.
Runner Judy Choi was concerned about air quality before the race and wasn’t sure the event would go on. Choi, 60, lives in Phoenix but grew up in Uptown and West Rogers Park. It was her 12th time running the Chinatown 5K.
She has fond memories of going to Chinatown while growing up, so the 5K has special significance for her. “It was so different in the ’70s,” she said. Few people had cars and there were more recent Chinese immigrants. “The moms would play mahjong and make treats,” Choi recalled.
Her husband, Raymond Choi, grew up in Bridgeport and also ran the 5K. The couple flew in to Chicago on Saturday around 5 a.m., in time for the race.
The air quality is worse in Phoenix, where there’s often a brown haze, said Raymond Choi, 63. “This is fine,” he said about Chicago’s air on Saturday, a few minutes after crossing the finish line.
Judy Choi fell during the race and got bandages at an ambulance near the finish. “I continued running,” Choi said. “That’s what Chicagoans do. You get up. We’re strong people.”