Last summer in our seventh year of riding the Pan-Mass Challenge, your support and generosity pushed us past $200,000 in fundraising for cancer research and care at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, MA. We can’t thank you enough for your continued support and encouragement. We never dreamed we would reach such a milestone in just seven years. This year we will contribute to a monumental milestone; the PMC will surpass ONE BILLION DOLLARS in all time donations to Dana-Farber! We hope you will join us and be one in a billion!

Your unbelievable support inspires us to ride again for the eighth time, something we couldn’t have conceived of when we started this journey. The fact that each year more family members and friends receive a cancer diagnosis fuels our passion to continue fighting this disease. This year alone, more than ten people close to us faced a cancer battle and again we were rocked when two dear friends lost their battles this spring. Each one hits us like a gut punch and underscores just how important research is and what a difference it makes; be it a new targeted treatment, better detection or ultimately a cure. When we ride this summer, as we have done each year, we will have nearly 80 ribbons on our backs to honor friends and family who have fought cancer and some very near to us who lost that battle. Our hope is that every pedal stroke brings us closer to better outcomes for those we love.

Last year, thanks to the generosity of incredible donors like you, PMC riders raised $72 million, every dollar of which directly supports cancer research and care at Dana-Farber. Did you know Dana-Farber has helped develop more than half of all cancer therapies approved by the FDA over the last five years??

So, will you be one in a billion and once again join us in fighting for a cure? We humbly ask you to donate and deeply appreciate your consideration to back us yet again. Every rider-earned dollar goes directly to Dana-Farber. When we ride, we think of how incredibly lucky we are to have so many wonderful people in our lives who support us, you are the truly the wind at our backs!

Thank you so much for your past support and for your consideration to help us this year!

We ride in loving memory of our moms Jeaninne and Dolores, Uncle Richie, Uncle Red, Charlie Conant, Uncle Bob, Uncle Paul, John David Van Etten, Leslie Hume, Butch Gregg, Antonia Hall, Chrissy Hajala and so many other friends and family who have been impacted by cancer. We also ride to honor two of the youngest and fiercest fighters in our family, Mollie and Gracie Ward!