The Ride to Conquer Cancer and the 'Experience Pyramid'

“And waiting

at the door,

the bicycle,

stilled,

because only moving

does it have a soul”

– from “Ode to Bicycles” by Pablo Neruda

This past weekend more than 3,500 Riders participated in the 16th?annual Ride to Conquer Cancer benefitting Princess Margaret Cancer Centre. And wow! Do we know how to host events with soul! Check out the attached pics. There are no second chances at a great event, so the best that any organization can do is plan, prepare, and most importantly, be ready for the unexpected.

And at this year’s Ride, we certainly didn’t expect air quality to be an issue leading up to the event! But health and safety are our top priority at our events and so we were fortunate to have world leading respirologists and pollution experts to consult with in our UHN Family leading up to the Ride and on the weekend. One of these doctors, Dr. John Granton, is also a long-time rider!

Nor did any of us probably expect to be so moved by all the patient stories at The Ride, including Gill Grant’s story at Opening Ceremonies as a 20-year non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma survivor, or the story of the impact of life-saving cancer research and novel drug therapies at Princess Margaret Cancer Centre for a father with Stage IV lung cancer, shared at Camp in Hamilton. But hearing about this patient’s experience directly from his brother, followed by his thoracic oncologist at Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, Dr. Adrian Sacher, and then seeing our patient on stage with his entire family, including his parents and 12-year-old son who did his first ride this year, just made your soul SING!!!

Our 2023 Ride to Conquer Cancer raised?$17.3 million?for life-saving cancer research, education, and care under the leadership of our three Honorary Chairs – Janet Bannister, Jen Lee Koss, and Natasha Walji!! And thanks to the dedication of our Riders, supporters, past Honorary Chairs, and volunteers, our Ride has raised more than $265 million since its inception! This makes The Princess Margaret Ride to Conquer Cancer the 4th largest single event fundraiser in North America by dollars raised, even when considering the CAD-USD exchange rate! (The top three event fundraisers by revenue, all held in the U.S., are the Pan-Mass Challenge benefitting the Dana Farber Cancer Institute; Pelotonia, an event that seeks to end cancer and benefits Ohio State University; and the AIDS/LifeCycle event benefitting the San Francisco AIDS Foundation and the Los Angeles LGBT Center).

At The Princess Margaret, we’re often asked why our events are so popular, with some of our events now in their second and third decade! (FYI: the oldest “mass event” fundraiser in Canada is the Ride for Heart, founded in 1985, benefitting the Heart & Stroke Foundation. In 2022, the Ride for Heart raised $1.28 million). An obvious answer why people choose our events is because they support our cause, and indeed three out of the four top event fundraisers in North America are cancer related. But the answer is in fact more complex.

In Finland, researchers studying the most compelling experiences in tourism have developed what they term “the experience pyramid” to illustrate the six key elements they believe are central to the creation of the most captivating event experiences, applied to charitable events. If you’ve participated in the Ride to Conquer Cancer, or our other events, you’ll see the link between these elements and our event experiences:

1. Individuality, which is about triggering in the participant a sense of being dignified as an individual.
2. Authenticity, which reflects the participant’s subjective perception of what a genuine event experience is.
3. The story, which performs the primary function of linking all the elements of an event experience.
4. Multisensory perception, which means the event offers an experience that can be appreciated through as many senses as possible.
5. Contrast, which refers to an event’s ability to contrast with what a participant might have been expecting for the event, or with their everyday routine.
6. Interaction, which represents the relationship between donors, the charity, the beneficiary, and other relevant stakeholder groups.

What does tourism have to do with P2P events in the charitable sector, you may be wondering??!! Tourism is about encountering something different. The tourist shifts from what is familiar and comfortable to what is new and out of the ordinary, just as participants at our events often do. A meaningful tourist experience is also positive and unforgettable. It is often associated with the feeling of exceeding oneself: you undertake and experience something you might not dare to do in your everyday life – again, just as our event participants do. And at its best, our Finnish researchers know that a meaningful experience can lead to a tourist’s personal development and change: after returning home, everyday life may be viewed in a totally new way.

At The Princess Margaret, we are changing the future of cancer in a totally new way. For example, in the next decade, we believe we can revolutionize cancer outcomes with early detection. We've developed a simple blood test that picks up over 50 different common cancers, often years before symptoms develop. And we also believe that cancer treatments need to be delivered in a whole new way. They need to be more effective, more precise, but also kinder and gentler. We believe in a world without toxic chemotherapy. We believe in a world with the most advanced robotics and other surgical tools, and the best particle therapy for cancer patients in Canada, who currently, can only obtain this therapy south of the border. We believe in a world where more cancers can be treated with a daily pill, as Dr. Sacher explained. These are some of the critical initiatives that our Riders’ fundraising is enabling.

Finally, with aging populations around the world triggering a cancer tsunami over the coming ten to fifteen years, cancer stands to be the greatest healthcare challenge humanity has ever faced. It's also going to be the greatest environmental challenge because there is no carbon free future that's also not cancer free. And cancer stands to be the greatest health equity challenge humanity has ever faced. So, we need to transform the future of cancer.

Only moving does a bicycle have a soul, as Pablo Neruda wrote.

And now we must move. Quickly. Because at The Princess Margaret, we know there’s a lot riding on us.

Wishing you all a great week.

Event News

• Join us on Father’s Day this Sunday, June 18th for the 10th anniversary of Journey to Conquer Cancer.
• Also, here are a few media highlights from The Ride to Conquer Cancer:

1. Niagara This Week?Interview with Bill Wall:?95-year-old blind Niagara Falls man in Ride to Conquer Cancer
2. ?Zoomer Radio?Interview with Bill Wall
3. Global Toronto?Interview with Bill Wall
4. Niagara Falls Review?Interview with Ryan Baillie:?Niagara’s Steve Cyclepaths top fundraising team for this weekend’s Ride to Conquer Cancer
5. Niagara This Week?Interview with Bill Wall:?95-year-old blind Niagara Falls man in Ride to Conquer Cancer (niagarathisweek.com)
6. Flamborough Review?Interview with Jeff Kleven of Geared for Life:?'To find a cure': Waterdown's Jeff Kleven will Ride to Conquer Cancer for 15th time
7. Newstalk 1010 The Rush with Reshmi Nair?Interview with Steve Merker aired?Part 1?and?Part 2
8. CBC Our Toronto?- Ryley’s Riders segment –?Part 1?and?Part 2
9. CP24 –?From starting line in Toronto
10. CTV Toronto?–?Post Ride kick-off in Toronto