Thousands to take to Toronto streets Sunday for Terry Fox Run

Adam Green was 15 when he was diagnosed with lymphoma.

The year that followed was a hard one, he says, but aggressive treatment and chemotherapy eventually put his disease into remission, and he's been cancer free for nearly 30 years now.

In that time, he's completed three major marathons in New York, Chicago and Berlin. He says those runs gave him even more appreciation for Terry Fox, who'd become a major role model after the life-saving treatment Green received as a teenager at Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children.

"You have to remember, Terry ran a marathon a day on one leg," he said. "That blows my mind."

Green is one of thousands of Torontonians who will be lacing up their sneakers for a good cause on Sunday, as Terry Fox Runs take place around the city and country, raising money for cancer research.

The Terry Fox Run is now in its 44th year. It was put on a brief hiatus during the pandemic, though Martha McClew, vice-president of community and school fundraising for the Terry Fox Foundation, says the charity raised more money the year the event went virtual than ever before. That momentum has carried on since the run returned to its normal format in 2022, she says, with Torontonians raising about $1 million last year, not counting school fundraisers.

"After four decades of Canadians loving Terry Fox, we just saw exactly how committed they were to cancer research," McClew said. 

McClew says the run remains as popular as ever, with over 15,000 people signed up for runs taking place all over Toronto Sunday. And she says people are still free to donate or sign up last minute for a run near them.

"We want to have a run close enough so that if you fall out of bed on Sunday morning and want to do something great, then you can come out to Terry Fox Run," McClew said.

Those runs have raised over $900 million since the inaugural event in 1981, when Fox died, one year after his Marathon of Hope.

Donations go to the Marathon of Hope Cancer Centres Network, which connects cancer researchers across 35 institutes in Canada.

Isabel Serrano, managing director of the Marathon of Hope Cancer Centres at the Terry Fox Research Institute, says that collaboration allows researchers to more easily share data and research, as they work to wipe out the disease that affects two in five Canadians during their lifetime.

She says donations from Terry Fox Runs are essential to advancing research in Canada.

"No other organization could have done that as effectively as the Terry Fox Research Institute and the Terry Fox Foundation, with really building on the legacy of Terry and his Marathon of Hope," she said.