Silicon Valley Turkey Trot celebrates 20 years of community goodwill

When more than 20,000 people hit the streets of downtown San Jose for the Applied Materials Silicon Valley Turkey Trot, they’ll be part of a tradition celebrating its 20th anniversary this year.

Carl Guardino still remembers waking up with his wife, Leslee, to a KCBS radio report about how 20,000 people were starting their Thanksgiving morning with a run to support local charities. The only problem was that run was in Sacramento, not San Jose.

”We thought, ‘Why doesn’t somebody do that here?’,” said Guardino, who was CEO of the Silicon Valley Leadership Group at the time. “Then we realized, maybe somebody was us.”

There are Turkey Trots all over the Bay Area now, but the Applied Materials Silicon Valley Turkey Trot remains the gold standard. People come with their co-workers or family members, hundreds dress up in costume even if they don’t take part in the official costume contest and people line the race route through downtown San Jose to cheer everybody on — whether they’re running the 5K or 10K, walking the course or pushing a stroller.

But, like most things in Silicon Valley, it began as a startup.

Both Leslee and Carl Guardino were both competitive runners — Leslee Guardino was an established triathlete — but starting a race from scratch was something new for them. Everything started falling into place when Applied Materials Vice President Joe Pon called Guardino to let him know that the Silicon Valley giant would sign on to be the run’s title sponsor.

“With that green light, we were literally off to the races,” Guardino said.

But the big question in 2005 was — would anyone wake up early on Thanksgiving morning to run through the streets of downtown San Jose? A week before the race, the answer did not look promising as only 100 people had registered. There were actually more volunteers signed up than runners at that point.

But about 1,000 more people registered in that last week, and even more showed up to register on the morning of the race — delaying the start by about 25 minutes. In the end, 1,932 people took part in that initial race. There were 3,200 in the second year, 6,400 the following year and 9,600 the year after that.

“By about year 12 or 13, it became the largest timed Thanksgiving Day run in the world, and it held that title seven straight years,” Guardino said.

But Guardino said the key to making the race a real success was focusing it on the community benefits.

“The three-legged stool on which we tried to build the Turkey Trot was build community, help the needy and start the holidays in a healthy way,” Guardino said.

More than $12 million has been donated over those two decades to the race’s beneficiary partners — currently the Health Trust — the Healthier Kids Foundation, Second Harvest of Silicon Valley and Second Harvest Food Bank of Santa Cruz County. And with more people in the Bay Area needing help than ever before, those agencies have often said they’re very thankful for the race’s participants and the huge network of Silicon Valley companies that sponsor the race.

The Turkey Trot was just the start, too. A few years later, the SVLG Foundation started the Santa Run to support Christmas in the Park, and later Heart & Soles, a spring run that originally was started to put salad bars in schools and which continues to support youth fitness and healthy eating. After Carl Guardino left the Silicon Valley Leadership Group in 2020, he started the Stars and Strides run to benefit the Valley Health Foundation.

When Ahmad Thomas took over as CEO, he knew that keeping the Turkey Trot going as a “virtual” run during the COVID-19 pandemic — and bringing it back in person in 2022 — were important to the community the organization was serving.

“It’s been an honor of mine to build upon this tradition and continue to grow and scale this race and achieve a positive impact,” Ahmad Thomas said. “Carl has been so kind, and that legacy of kindness in our community is at the core of this event. Those who participate in it and have the opportunity to give back are better people for it. And our community is better for it.”

Carl and Leslee Guardino will be at the race Thursday, as is their Thanksgiving tradition. Their 20-year-old daughter, Jessica, has participated in every race and is now a Division I cross-country runner. Their daughter, Siena, will be singing the National Anthem to start the race.

“It’s what we do as a family,” Guardino said. “We hope this lives on well beyond us and continues to grow.”

EARLY THANKSGIVING: Tanya Moniz-Witten has been president at San Jose Water for less than a year, but Thursday she got to participate in Operation Gobble, one of the utility company’s most heartwarming events. In partnership with the California Water Association, San Jose Water distributed Safeway gift cards to several nonprofit agencies in the valley to help families facing hardship this year.

The agencies nominated by local elected officials were: East Palo Alto Senior Center and Fondo de Solidaridad de Mountain View; West Valley Community Services; Mandas Amino Y Amistad (M.A.Y.A) Services; Catholic Charities of Santa Clara County; the Afghan Coalition; and Sunnyvale Community Services.

WALL BUSTING: Usually, you see elected officials lining up to shovel dirt or cut ribbons on a new building. But Friday, San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan and Councilmember Dev Davis grabbed a sledgehammer and took a few whacks at the ranger station slated to be demolished at the Guadalupe River Park’s Confluence Point downtown.

“This may have been a good idea when it was built,” Mahan said, “But it’s overstayed its welcome. It’s unused, it’s been abandoned, it’s unfortunately been lived in, had fires and trash. It’s become a symbol of blight in one of the most important gateways in our downtown.”

The station, which was originally built in 1997 but has been vacant and unused for more than a decade, has been a target for vandalism and graffiti in recent years. Then intention is to turn the space into an open plaza with views of the river and the opportunity for educational experiences.

“This is arguably the best ground-level view of the city anywhere in the city, and it’s finally going to be revealed,” said Carl Salas, a member of the Guadalupe River Park Conservancy board, who also took some swings with the hammer.

He wasn’t the only one. Guadalupe River Park Conservancy Executive Director Jason Su, Garden City Construction CEO Jim Salata and even Commonwealth Club of California CEO Gloria Duffy donned hard hats and took their shots.

I’m no therapist, but it seemed like some of them may have been venting their frustrations on the poor wall. If the Guadalupe River Park Conservancy had charged residents $5 for a 5-minute session, they could have made a mint.

POLITICAL PERSPECTIVE: If you’re still trying to make sense of the Nov. 5 election, Garrick Percival, chair of San Jose State’s political science department, is here to help with an unbiased analysis. He’ll be giving an online presentation for the South Bay Democratic Coalition at 7 p.m. on Nov. 25 to cover how pollsters and pundits missed the mark. Go to www.southbaydemocraticcoalition.org for information on how to attend.