29th Annual Smith McMillan 5K - 2026

Join us for The Compassion 5K, a community-centered race supporting both people and pets in need of compassionate care. Hosted by Griswold Home Care, this event brings together runners, walkers, families, and animal lovers to make a positive impact in New Castle County.

Proceeds from the race will benefit Faithful Friends Animal Society - helping provide food, care, and safe housing for furry friends. Whether you’re a seasoned runner, casual walker, or simply want to support the cause, this event offers something for everyone.

Together we hope to raise awareness in care options for our loved ones – both people and pets.

Help support healthy waterways in our community! Held in partnership with Concord Township, this event is a fundraiser to help raise money for watershed protection projects, including trail maintenance and erosion control, tree maintenance and plantings, streambank restorations, improvements to structures and public spaces within the watershed area, and water quality monitoring.

Schedule

• 8am 5K registration

• 8:40am Pre-race warm up by Yoga Six

• 9am 5K begins

• 10-2pm Family Fun Festival with vendors, games, music, food trucks, and more

• 11am 1st heat duck race with $100 first place prize

• 12:00 championship duck race with $1,000 grand prize

• 12:30 awards ceremony

The Chester creek, which runs through Newlin Grist Mill, is listed as impaired by the Pennsylvania DEP. When water quality is low, it has a detrimental impact on human health and safety, as well as the plants and animals that rely on our waterways. We monitor our stretch of the creek very closely by tracking pollutants, water temperature, and other factors that could impact the rich biodiversity of our streams. We have documented over a dozen species of freshwater fish in the stream, as well as turtles, aquatic insects, freshwater mussels, and the trout that we stock for our fly fishing program. Many other species depend upon healthy waterways, including herons, wood ducks, muskrats, mink, beaver, and other mammals. The landscape around the creek, known as a watershed, has significant impacts on water quality. Pollutants like road salt, lawn fertilizer, and soil erosion from construction all end up in the creek and harms aquatic life. Communities can improve water quality through projects

like riparian buffer restoration, storm water runoff management, and erosion reduction. Help us help the watershed by raising funds to support upcoming healthy creek improvement projects in the park!

• 5K: $35 per runner entry fee. $40 day of. Prizes will be awarded in each age group for both men and women. Free beer at the finish line for runners over 21, sponsored by Succession Fermentory

• Duck Race: $20 per duck or $50 for 3 ducks. $1,000 cash grand prize.

Join us for our annual UPD 5K.

This race benefits Ulster Project Delaware (UPD). UPD was founded in 1976 as a program to build understanding between Northern Irish Catholic and Protestant teenagers. Each July, the project brings a group of teenagers between the ages of 14 and 16, half Catholic, half Protestant, and half girls, half boys, to the Wilmington area where they live with host teenagers and their families for four weeks. During that month, the teens participate in a variety of team building, social, sightseeing, spiritual and service activities that enable them to create enduring friendships and mutual understanding.