CN Cycle for CHEO breaks record with more than $2.1 million raised

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A little rain on Sunday couldn’t dampen the spirits of thousands of walkers and cyclists who attended the CN Cycle for CHEO, raising a record $2.175 million for childhood cancer research and care.

“We didn’t just break the record, we crushed it,” Steven Read, president and CEO of the CHEO Foundation, said in an interview.

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Now in its 17th year, the CN Cycle for CHEO features 15km, 35km or 70km cycling routes, along with twokm and fivekm walking routes for people of all ages.

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More than 7,000 people participated, the largest participation in the history of the event.

Tamy Bell was the top individual fundraiser, raising more than $61,000. She is the mother of Griffin Bell, who was diagnosed with neuroblastoma in 2018 at just 16 months old. She died in March, at the age of six, after a long battle with aggressive childhood cancer.

Bell was also part of Griff’s Gang, a 613-person team that raised a record $323,469.

“Last year he was with us,” Bell said, his voice breaking with emotion as he addressed the large crowd. who stayed to listen to the speeches despite the rain that returned after a brief pause during the event.

“He ran the full three miles.”

Griffin, known for being a spark plug and a bit of an artist, underwent multiple rounds of chemotherapy, which shrank the tumor so it could be removed. He was declared cancer-free in March 2019, but sadly relapsed two years later when the tumor returned.

When Bell found out Only four percent of all money raised for cancer research goes to childhood cancers. She founded Little Press Co., which produces stylish t-shirts, sweaters and mugs, and donated a portion of her sales to CHEO to help affected families in the Ottawa region. for childhood cancer.

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Bell previously told this newspaper that there is no manual for children with recurrent neuroblastoma. He called CN Cycle for CHEO the best day of the year.

“If we can play a small part in ensuring that no other family has to feel like we do today, or go through what we went through these last six years, by raising money for more research and care, then that is what we are doing. “I’m going to keep doing it,” Bell said Sunday.

Read said this year’s fundraiser is the “most impactful” in the event’s history. In addition to breaking fundraising records, this year’s event also broke participation records.

“I’ve always noticed that some of the families whose children have been through the hardest times are the first in line to help us,” Read said. “And it’s a reminder to us of how important this is to the work that we do at CHEO, and how important it is to continue working on research and finding new treatments, new cures, new diagnoses, new ways to treat children that they make Experience a better experience for the next and the next and the next.”

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