Pan-Massachusetts Challenge gives $30,384,200 to the Jimmy Fund for 30-year total of $270 million

Official announcement of PMC gift to Dana-Farber Cancer Institute (from the PMC blog, and many other places.) I've added bold to the parts that I think are particularly noteworthy. In 2009, Joe Parrish and I riders raised $16,704 and, since our members started riding in 2003, we've cumulatively raised $118,458. My personal total is $45,154.

BOSTON (Saturday, December 5, 2009)— The 2009 Pan-Massachusetts Challenge (PMC) has contributed $30,384,200 to adult and pediatric cancer research and care at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute through its August cycling event.

This PMC fundraising gift is the single largest contribution made to the Jimmy Fund in 2009, representing 50 percent of the charity’s annual revenue. The funds raised by the 4,937 cyclists of the 2009 PMC brings the organization’s 30-year total Jimmy Fund gift to exactly $270 million.

The organization had set the fundraising goal at $30 million.“Exceeding our fundraising goal in this troubled economy is a tribute to PMC riders’ commitment to raising money for cancer research and care,” said Billy Starr, PMC founder and executive director. “It also shows that people understand the necessity of funding research for this deadly disease.”

The ceremonial check was presented to Dana-Farber President Edward J. Benz, Jr., MD, at the House of Blues Saturday night at a party attended by some 800 PMC cyclists and volunteers. The contribution represents 100 percent of every rider-raised dollar, a charity pass-through rate that is nearly unparalleled within the $3 billion athletic fundraising event industry.

This is possible due to presenting sponsors the Boston Red Sox Foundation and Overstock.com who, along with 200 other corporate sponsors, underwrite the cost of producing the event and provide in-kind contributions of goods and services. In addition, 3,000 volunteers work throughout the year and during PMC weekend, fulfilling many roles that are typically paid positions.

“The money the PMC raises is critical to our work. It enables us to invest in major new patient care and research initiatives that could otherwise go unfunded,” Dr. Benz said. “In this economy, when non-profit organizations are seeing a decrease in private, corporate and federal funding, we are extremely appreciative of the PMC’s extraordinary support.” Dana-Farber is one of the top cancer research and treatment institutes in the country. The PMC is among Dana-Farber’s largest funders.

In 2009, the PMC attracted 4,937 cycling fundraisers from 36 states and eight countries. Each cyclist was required to raise a minimum of between $1,000 and $4,200 to participate, depending on the route chosen. Routes ranged from 47 to 190 miles over one or two days. More than 90 percent of PMCers raised more than their respective fundraising minimum, according to Starr.

Founded in 1980 when 36 cyclists rode across Massachusetts and raised $10,200 for the Jimmy Fund, the PMC is known today as the “gold standard” of athletic fundraising events, due to the unprecedented sums it raises and its consistently efficient charity pass-through rate. In 30 years, 61,606 cyclists have ridden in the PMC and 36,269 people have volunteered to make the PMC such a successful and well-supported event.

The PMC was among the very first athletic fundraising events in the nation and it was a pioneer in the way it focused on raising money for charity.

The 31st annual PMC is set for August 7 and 8, 2010. Registration opens online on January 12 for alumni and January 19 for newcomers. For more information about the Pan-Mass Challenge visit www.pmc.org.

The Energizer Bunny; $8,356

Remember the Energizer Bunny that just kept going and going. Well, Team Avanti's supporters just pushed my fundraising tally to $8,356 for 2009. Dare I say that $10k is actually within reach? I'm not pushing, but I know it's possible.

Please invite others to contribute to fund the lifesaving research at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute at http://www.pmc.org/profile/JM0403

Thank you!

John

I'm Riding to Honor Robin. Who Else Will Come Along on the Ride?

This is part of a note I wrote to my friend's younger sister, who's a woman of strength and grace who has faced an unspeakable challenge just the way I would hope to. THIS is why I ride the PMC -- to honor the fallen and, I hope, make this experience less common. To share someone in your life who we can take on the ride, please add a comment to our post "We Ride the PMC to Honor Survivors and Angels." To donate to the PMC, please join my PaceLine.


"Jenny,
"I learned just a week ago today that Robin's memorial service was held the day after I sent your mom a note about my plans to ride the Pan-Mass Challenge again to honor Eve, Helga, and countless others who have battled cancer. I was so sad to hear that Robin had lost her battle, and not at all surprised to hear your mom say you are a rock and an angel. I can't imagine the difficulty of watching either of my older brothers battle and suffer, and I also hope that I'll rise to the level of grace, generosity and love you gave if ever I'm faced with the challenge. Larry and Clarence were amazing, as I can easily imagine you were in the face of suffocating anguish. Let's believe that Robin has joined such lively, just, funny women as Eve and Helga, and that they all are comfortable and content as they watch over us.

"On Saturday, I'll mount my bike and join 5000 riders in a trek from Sturbridge and Wellesley out to Provincetown on the tip of Cape Cod. If possible, can you email me a picture of Robin to carry with me?

"I'm riding 192 miles over the two days, and the miles roll more quickly when I carry the names, images, and stories of people who have battled cancer. Any physical discomfort of riding (mostly on my most posterior point!) evaporates by thinking loving thoughts of loved ones lost too early. It's also an inspiration to push so very hard on the last miles through the softly swaying grass of the dunes of Provincetown. As some sort of gesture, it feels appropriate to push myself as hard as possible those last miles and put everything into finishing strong and fast.

"One paragraph I wrote to your mom felt so true, I'll paste it here: I didn't really realize how special a place Robin and your whole family occupy in my image of my childhood until this week. Robin was the elegant, kind, gracious, gorgeous "older sister" who was really nice to me and the other little kids who I recall buzzing a round her at Lake Valhalla. My memories of those times are painted with pictures, warm sunlight, and fond feelings. Robin, Jenny, Jimmy, Robby, you, and Dwight were anchors of that summer experience, as well as fun times in and around your Elston Road house.

I am so sorry for your loss, and so grateful to have shared wonderful parts of life with Robin and you.

Fondly,

John

A Season of Firsts

This has been a season of firsts for me.

It's the first time I'm riding the Pan-Mass Challenge without my buddy and Team Avanti co-founder, Rob Rodgers.

Last week was the first time I'd ridden farther than the 84 miles of the first day of the Pan-Mass Challenge when I rode 86 miles to reach Mike Moody, my Class of '86 buddy, in Rye, NH.

This Sunday, I rode my first century when I completed the 101-mile "Climb to the Clouds" from Concord, MA to Mt. Wachusett and back. (See the map and elevation chart below.)

Today, I learned that the first of my childhood friends, Robin, lost her battle with cancer. Images of her and her family will dance through my mind and flow through my tears as I roll over the coming miles.

In less than two weeks, I'll ride the original Pan-Mass Challenge route from Sturbridge to Provincetown in this, the 30th PMC. The first 29 have generated $239 million to support the life-saving research at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute.

Could this be the first year you support my fundraising efforts for the Pan-Mass Challenge? And/or join my PMC PaceLine where you create a rider/avatar to ride along with me? Or increase your support to $192 (or a multiple) -- a dollar for each mile I'll ride? Or contribute $30 and invite 30 of YOUR friends to support the ride -- a dollar and a friend for each of the 30 years the PMC has been conducted? I hope so!











Climb to the Clouds Map and Elevation Chart (Click to see a larger image.)

My First Century Ride

Please donate to the Jimmy Fund and fund more lifesaving research by clicking the PMC logo. You can also join my "PaceLine" when you donate.

I think the 86 miles I rode to Rye, NH last week was the longest ride I'd ever done. This week, on Sunday, I'll do my first "century" ever -- 100 miles on a bike. It's even got a name, "Climb to the Clouds," which suggests "you're going to climb hills, suckah!" don't you think? That we'll do, climbing part way up Mt. Wachusett. The summit is closed, sadly, but I'm not sure I'm devastated by that. We "lose" the opportunity to climb 700 verticle feet in about two miles. Translation: steep and long.

The map below shows the route.

I'm doing this so the 110 miles on the first day of the PMC won't loom quite so large, and to see how I feel the next day. 'Course, I don't have to ride another 82 miles on Monday ;)

Wildlife Impact on PMC Training

Please donate to the Jimmy Fund and the Dana Farber through my Pan Mass Challenge PaceLine.

Riding through the western suburbs of Boston is fraught with wildlife encounters you might not imagine. Last year, on an early morning ride, two squirrels launched themselves from the woods alongside the road in front of me. The first was 20 feet ahead of me and caused me to wonder "how likely is it that I'd ever actually hit a squirrel? My wheels aren't really very big -- a squirrel could go in front or behind the wheel, and if I did hit it, I wonder if it would knock me off my bike."

Not 50 feet later, squirrel #2 beat all the odds and actually put its poor little head INTO the spokes of my front wheel. Neither the squirrel nor the wheel survived the encounter, though I didn't crash.

My buddies teased me mercilessly every time I flinched when a squirrel or chipmunk so much as peeked from behind a log.

This spring, we were riding along Rice Road in Wayland, approaching a picturesque spot near a pond with picturesque Belted Galloway cows -- think of a cross between an Oreo cookie and a cow. "Look, there's a cute calf frolicking with it's mamma!" Frolicking right up until it saw our Spandex-clad Posse coming along at 17 MPH. Startled, it jumped like a bucking bronco, which startled the gaggle of turkeys -- about six of them. They jumped off the historic stone wall into the air in something approximating flight and headed across the road -- right toward our heads!


All five of us ducked in our saddles and were grateful to be upright. As we made the next turn, I got to see a huge dump of turkey poop on Rob's shoulder just as he said "Ahhhhh, that turkey shat on me!"

So, when riding your bike, look out for chipmunks, squirrels, cows and turkeys. They can have quite an impact!

If you chuckled, or not, please support the life-saving research at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute by contributing to my Pan-Mass Challenge PaceLine ride.

I'm Riding for Charlie and Bootsie

Joe and I rode 40 miles on Wednesday on a route through Sherborn and Dover that he had raved about since last year. As soon as we turned on "Farm Road," the beauty intensified. Then Strawberry Hill Road, and then Wilsondale. He described a fun descent and a gorgeous traverse. "Wilsondale" sounded familiar. I recognized it by the feel of it, knowing that Charlie and Bootsie Carothers, both angels I work to honor when I ride the PMC, raised a most spectacular brood of wonderful people -- Sarah, Mike, Lalla, and Matt. Charlie and Bootsie were spectacular friends and parents when they lived, and inspirations now. Sarah was one of the first PMC riders we sponsored, and Lalla is a godmother to our daughter.

I choked up as I passed their lovely yellow house with the barn on the curve of the road behind the stone wall, remembering warmth and friendship that never, ever waned.

Please support the live-saving cancer research by joining my PMC PaceLine and empowering the incredible doctors at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute.

Do it for Bootsie! (It just rolls off the tongue, don't it? ;)

Re-engagment

108 days to the 30th Pan Mass Challenge

Please support our ride in the Pan Mass Challenge by donating to fund research at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute via the Jimmy Fund. Any help of any amount is appreciated, and 100% of your donations go to the Dana Farber Cancer Center.
To contribute this year, click on the bike logo or  cut-and-paste: http://www.pmc.org/mypmc/profiles.asp?Section=story&eGiftID=TA0044
Thank you!

It's been a long way from there to here -- more than a month! As a blogger, that'd qualify me to lose interest from any readers.  As a dad, skier, professional, and non-profit board member, I banked some extra points, I hope. 

A big phrase in my daily experience is "so that....".  So I'll apply it -- or reapply it -- to this blog and the PMC.  I blog "so that I'll capture and share my experience of the PMC from early-on through the post-ride rampdown."  I blog "so that I'll have a mechanism that helps me focus on the great, broad opportunity that being a PMC rider provides."  And I blog "so that I'll have an obligation to meet."  

So.....how can you help, if you'd like to, or you are willing to?   

Please comment "so that I'll have motivating feedback."  I am energized by it, whether it's provocative, critical, humorous, or a shared story. " 

Please ride your bike with me "so that I'll have another person to get to know better, which always happens, and so that I'll have another person whose willingness to ride will make it all that much more enticing to get on the bike." 

Please think how you could support the cancer research at the Dana Farber through our ride in the PMC "so that fewer and fewer people will face the challenges of fighting cancer."  You could donate directly, provide a raffle item, co-host a humdinger of a party we're thinking about, and invite your friends to join you, me, and the thousands of contributors who make the PMC the single most productive athletic fundraiser in the world. 

Fantastic!  40 days "off" and writing this one post has me all torqued up again to get back in the blogger saddle, and get back on the bike, and get back to asking to ride the PMC in honor of friends and family. 

Wordle My Pan Mass Challege Blog

148 days to the 30th Pan Mass Challenge | 200 Days to the PMC Blog
Please donate to fund research at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute via the Jimmy Fund/Pan Mass Challenge.
Any help of any amount is appreciated, and 100% of your donations go to the Dana Farber Cancer Center.
To contribute this year, click here or or cut-and-paste: http://www.pmc.org/mypmc/profiles.asp?Section=story&eGiftID=TA0044
Thank you!

Wordle is a fun free service that automatically creates a visual from the words on a web page, or in a blog like mine. Here's the Wordle of my blog. Click to see it in higher resolution.

"Attachments"

150 days to the 30th Pan Mass Challenge | 200 Days to the PMC Blog
Please donate to fund research at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute via the Jimmy Fund/Pan Mass Challenge.
Any help of any amount is appreciated, and 100% of your donations go to the Dana Farber Cancer Center.
To contribute this year, click on the bike logo. Or, here is the URL, spelled out for easy cut-and-paste: http://www.pmc.org/mypmc/profiles.asp?Section=story&eGiftID=TA0044
Thank you!

My Avanti teammate Rob shared a wonderful essay on the power of "attachments" over us. To paraphrase, "we are attached to something, or someone, if we believe it is the source of our joy, pleasure, or happiness. Only by enjoying it without clinging to it can we be happy."

That's really, really hard.

Can I love my wife, children, family and friends and enjoy them thoroughly without clinging to them, without having expectations about my relationships and the "outcomes" of our interactions?

That's really, really hard.

But by thinking about it, considering it, and setting the intention to resisting "clinging," it becomes easier and easier to do so.

Friends were talking about attachments, and most identified spouses, children as the attachments they cling to most fiercely. They experience, or expect to experience, tremendous pain at the thought of the death of a nuclear family member. And yet, I am a son whose parents both have died, and whose friends have died, and yet I still can and do live joyfully. I know several parents whose children have died so very prematurely, and they are joyful. That's not to say their hearts aren't broken. I can hear my friend John's voice crying "My heart is broke!" over and over after his son died. And yet, he is resilient and lives and loves.

And so can I, and so can you.

John

Frustration vs. Living in the Moment

156 days to the 30th Pan Mass Challenge | 200 Days to the PMC Blog
Please donate to fund research at the Dana Farber via the Jimmy Fund/Pan Mass Challenge - click the bike.

156 days to the 30th Pan Mass Challenge, and I am teetering between frustration and living in the moment.

Having four of five family members battling the flu-ish bug is frustrating. It made it much more challenging to be enchanted by the present moments that presented themselves over the February vacation week. Like a fun ski race, two beautiful, snowstorms, a day with my brother and his boy, lovely drives with my daughter and an excellent meeting with a client who wants us to do more.

Great moments teetering on the other side of the see-saw trying to overcome the weight of frustration.

Frustration has a strong hold on a part of my professional life. The economy presents challenges for my financial services startup, but also is the driving force behind the need for our products and services.

And today I found a posting what looks like a dream (FT) job for me - the title has four of my favorite six business words. I was flying high with excitement, and then I heard that the company had not secured anticipated funding and downsized drastically.

I can only imagine the frustration of battling cancer, and then I remember how many battlers have been grateful for the shock that leads them to learn how to live fully in the moment.

I'm looking forward to the moments of the coming 156 days!

"Degree of Difficulty"

My daughter has a hideous, hideous cold, complete with fever, cough, congestion, and sore throat. She feels yukky and thinks life couldn't get worse. Wrong-o, babycakes, but that's a 'feature' of being a blessedly healthy 13-year-old.

My friend Geoff broke his neck ski racing three weeks ago. Clean break of a cervical vertebrae. He was pretty loopy and really sore, but not paralyzed. Ended his ski season, but not his life, and not his mobility. He'll recover with no fear of relapse.

Cancer is tough, and deserves to be defeated. Please join the fight by doing what you can. Some suggestions.
1) Give blood.
2) Give platelets.
3) Fund research.

Thanks!

"Sync"

173 days to the 30th Pan Mass Challenge.

Yesterday, I felt out of "sync" because I was out of my normal, winter Saturday routine of skiing. Body and mind were unbalanced, and I felt disoriented until I recognized "why." Only then could I rebalance and get synced with myself.

If I got knocked out of balance from such a relatively small disturbance, what must it be like to be whacked, thwacked, shoved and pummeled by something big, like a cancer diagnosis, or having a loved one lose the battle with cancer?

It's huge, I know from experience, and my way through relied on contemplation, expression, and relying on others who had strength I lacked at that moment. Then, it took me years to regain my balance. Fortunately, I'm wiser now and faster to turn to my trusted tools.

How do you get back in sync?

Losing my mom, Eve, and then her best friend, Helga, disturbed my balance for years.

From PMC 2008

Jen Kay's death, so offensively early, brought focus to "doing good."

From PMC 2008

Debi Finnerty was an angel on earth, brightening the day of children, their families, her friends and colleagues. The world was brighter every day that she shined her happy smile and loving heart. She battled valiantly, but lost in 2006.

From PMC 2008

Kicked By An Angel

"Kicked By An Angel" is a moving blog, subtitled "My thoughts on life as I struggle through breast cancer"

Frances bade 2008 "Good riddance!" with the following lessons:

I am not the same person I was before my cancer diagnosis. I can’t say that I am better or worse — just different. I look at life, my children, daily tasks from a different skew. I have a better appreciation regarding the passing of time and a renewed respect to really try to live in the moment. I can’t say that I now live every day as if it were my last but I do think about and cherish the small intricate details more often; especially regarding my children.

So on this snowy New Years Eve at the end of 2008 here is a list of things that I learned:

1. Pettiness and Drama have no place in my life and I learned to cut out all the people who perpetuate those energy-sapping qualities.

2. I have absolutely no control over many things in life –including many aspects of my own health as well as the actions of others.

3. Most people are generally well-meaning, well-intentioned, and kind.

4. Everyone, including myself, feels jealous and resentful at times. We must have been given those emotions for a reason. I think it’s OK to feel them as long as we admit it instead of feeling ashamed. Maybe jealousy is there to spur us into action.

5. People can change, and they do, all the time.

6. Relationships enter our lives when we need them and stay while we continue to learn and grow. When we no longer learn and grow then that relationship passes;not to be mourned, but to be celebrated, and remembered fondly.

7. Forgiveness is the most important gift we have to give each other; because nobody is perfect (not even my mother!)

See the rest of the post, and many more, at Kicked by an Angel.

"Snow Days"

Snow days were so much fun when I was a kid. They were so different, so free...truly days off.

There were no snow days in college, and I declined to embrace one that came my way when a Nor'easter flooded New York Harbor. In Boston, the 35" April Fool's day blizzard kept me home, and that was fun.

Now with three kids, snow days are less irregular, but require more creativity, especially when the snow turns to rain.

How many days do we get that are the snowdays of our youth or of our untethered adulthood? Can I enjoy snowdays when they are less free, require more logistcs, and require shovelling three times a day?

Yes I can, and I will, find a way to live every single day fully. That's the challenge and opportunity of snow days.

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184 days to the PMC. 2009 miles: 20.
"200 Days to the PMC" Blog

"Reminders"

Although he keeps a journal, a friend was befuddled by my plan to blog through the PMC season. And I didn't have a good answer at the time.

Today I concluded that blogging is a reminder to remember why I'm committed to contributing to the campaign to eradicate cancer.

Remembering family and friends who have been touched by cancer. Remembering those we have lost, and reminding myself that the $35 million that riders raised last year, which - without question- has advanced treatments that have saved and extended lives into 2009. Furthermore, I'm committed because the PMC delivers more to the Dana Farber than any other athletic fundraiser, and it does so at 100% efficiency, which is unprecedented. These charts tell the compelling story another way: Top Fundraising Events in the USA and Massachusetts.

Pan-Massachusetts Challenge Gives $35 Million to the Jimmy Fund
PMC Founder Billy Starr on the success of the event

Please click the PMC logo
to donate to support the research at
the Dana Farber Cancer Institute.

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190 days to the PMC (0 miles ridden this year)

"It's Cold!"

It's COLD here in New England! So cold, our kids' ski program didn't ski this morning. So cold that people abandoned their plans!

I adjusted my plan, and my expectations, and still got outside this morning, enjoying the clear blue skies and the curling wisps of fireplace smoke that then tumbled over the fields and into the woods. This afternoon, I bundled up and skied, and it was fantastic and delightful. I didn't even feel "cold" because I was dressed in everything that keeps me warm.

Life is cold! You just have to bundle up and go. Cold as it may be, that's no reason to miss out on the beauty, fun, and nuances of each day.

196 days to the PMC.

"Challenges"

The Pan Mass Challenge is a set of big challenges. And "challenge" is in the name, so "hard" is OK!

It's a bit of a challenge to register your first year. It's a big challenge to say "I'll commit to raising thousands of dollars, or pay it myself!" It's a big challenge to raise that much money. It's a challenge to find the time to train enough to be able to be confident heading toward the start of the longest ride you may ever have done. It's a challenge to stay safe, and courteous, through dozens of towns that accommodate the ride.

Those all semm like challenges, until I think of the challenge of battling cancer.

Then it seems pretty reasonable, and well within my grasp.

197 days to go.