I am very excited to be back again riding for my EIGHTH PMC this August. My first PMC in 2017 was truly a life changing experience that has dedicated me to participating annually. The energy that surrounds the ride is like no other athletic event I have competed in. It is an uplifting event, focused on finding a cure for a disease that touches so many lives in one way or another. The emotion you experience listening to the stories of survivors, families and friends effected by the disease pushes you through the two-day ride knowing the awareness and funds this ride raises is making a difference.
My first year, I had the privilege to be a part of a group of three riders who dedicated their Pan Mass Challenge (PMC) ride to our late friend Davey Hovey’s CRUS11TOUR Team. The CRUS11TOUR has made amazing strides since and has grown to over ONE-HUNDRED riders!! We have rallied teammates from all over the country to carry Davey’s college #11 on our backs across the 192 mile course.
The PanMass Challenge follows a course from Sturbridge, MA across the pike, through Cape Cod to the tip of Provincetown, MA. My ride is dedicated to my late friend Dave Hovey, who lost a battle with Brain Cancer (Stage IV Glioblastoma) in February 2017 at the age of 26. Davey was diagnosed in the Fall of 2015 just after his 25th birthday, undergoing 5 brain surgeries, 2 clinical trials, 2 rounds of radiation, 3 rounds of chemo and suffering over 25 seizures. Despite the brutal beating his body was taking, Davey fought like a champ with a positive attitude, all the while tirelessly fundraising and raising awareness for his rare cancer. He coined his fundraising effort the CRUS11TOUR, where he raised over $133,000 during the summer of 2016 playing 100 holes of golf in one day and over $407,000 with his marathon team that ran in the Boston Marathon on April 17, 2017. To date Team CRUS11TOUR has raised over $5.5M for brain cancer through these events and the PMC.
Davey and I shared three special places we called home. Boston where we both settled after college, Simsbury, CT where we both grew up and Chatham, MA where both our families spent summers – 191 miles away on Cape Cod. This distance, between where we grew up and spent our summers, is significant because the PMC is 192 miles. Almost exactly the same distance, tracing the route both our families have driven countless times to Chatham. I will be carrying Davey’s infectious spirit on this ride, joining his CRUS11TOUR effort to spread awareness of this terrible disease that took an amazing person far too young.
My fundraising donations will specifically be going to the David Hovey - CRUS11TOUR Fund to support neuro-oncology research performed by Dr. David Reardon who treated Davey at Dana Farber. Thank you for taking the time to read my PMC story and supporting the CRUS11TOUR!!
#CRUS11TOUR #thisonesfordavey #keepthefaith
