The Dana-Farber Cancer Institute calls its biggest fund-raiser of the year the Pan-Mass Challenge.

 

But participants know that the challenge of riding their bicycles 177 miles from Worcester to Provincetown pales in comparison to the day-to-day challenge faced by cancer survivors.

 

"Riding side-by-side, you share stories," Great Barrington's Peter Whitehead said recently. "Everyone has a story, whether it's personal themselves or a family member. There's a lot of back-and forth.

 

"And there's the Living Proof group that gathers together on Saturday afternoon at the end of the ride. All the people who have had cancer or still have cancer. People often at the end of that meeting get up to tell a story, and it's just amazing some of the things people have gone through in their fight against cancer.

 

"It's inspirational."

 

For 46 years, riders have been drawing on those inspirations to power through a two-day ride across the commonwealth and raise funds for the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Since 1980, the event has raised $1.125 billion for the treatment and research center, and it accounts for 67 percent of the Jimmy Fund's annual revenue.

 

This year's ride, scheduled for Aug. 1 and 2, includes at least 17 Berkshire County residents among the 6,000 cyclists planning to complete the ride to the tip of Cape Cod.

 

Lenox's Suzanne Merritt is part of the Living Proof riders. She has been raising money for the cause for 15 years and made her first ride in 2013, less than a year out of active cancer treatment.

 

That alone made her first ride a "huge undertaking" for the fitness professional, who owns and operates Lenox Fit. But she was not about to sit on the sidelines.

 

"For me, it was a personal mission because Dana-Farber saved my life, and all the fund-raising from the Pan-Mass Challenge goes directly to Dana-Farber," Merritt said. "I'm a genetics patient at Dana-Farber, and I will be for life. I have a genetic feature that produces four different types of cancer. I already had one, and they've done preventive surgery for a second one."

 

Merritt continues to be monitored regularly by the specialists at Dana-Farber to watch for signs of the other two cancers.

 

She is worried about the future of research like that done at Dana-Farber in light of recent federal cuts to funding for scientists.

 

"It's more important than ever that private donors step up," Merritt said. "Especially in Massachusetts. We lost over a billion dollars just this year in cancer research funding."

 

Merritt, while inspiring others as a Living Proof rider, draws strength and affirmation from her fellow riders.

 

"When you have cancer and you recover from cancer and then you are 'done' with treatment, people expect you to go back to you as they knew you," she said. "But you are different after that.

 

"I didn't feel like I had a community that understood me. The Pan-Mass Challenge gave me that. Everyone either experienced cancer, was a caregiver for someone with cancer or was just really passionate about raising money for the cause. I was immediately surrounded by and accepted by a community that was thinking like I was and continues to."

 

Merritt rides on team ForzaG, where she is a teammate of Pittsfield's Matthew Behnke.

 

He got involved with the cause in 2020 after losing a relative and a close friend to cancer.

 

Behnke writes about the experience on his official PMC fund-raising page.

 

"Three weeks before he passed, Tom Serene rode his bike with me, and I decided that day that if he could pick himself up after a morning at the Vallejo transfusion clinic and take me on a bike ride along the beautiful Napa River, then I could continue that bike ride in his memory," Behnke writes. "Tom Serene was the biking buddy who was willing to follow a road to see where it went, the choir buddy who simultaneously saw the deep humor and deep spirituality in church participation, the fellow educator who pushed to make school a better place for his students. Do what you love, do it now."

 

While not a Living Proof rider himself, Behnke continues to be moved by others who fight the disease on a personal level and join the collective fight by tackling the PMC.

 

"I have a teammate from Maine, and I remember two summers ago I was riding, and he was rooming with me on one of the overnights," Behnke said this month. "He got up extra early because he had to take his chemo treatment before riding 100 miles.

 

"I thought, 'I have nothing to complain about here.'

 

"You draw so much inspiration from these Living Proof riders. It can't always happen. But you want to hold onto those inspiring stories."

 

Behnke also is motivated by the people in his life, like his friend Tom, who were taken by cancer.

 

This year, that group grew to include teaching colleague Irene McMahon.

 

"She was such a big part of the community of my school and in Pittsfield and losing her this past fall to cancer, it was such a blow," Behnke said. "The whole school wore green ribbons and we dedicated a bench to her memory, and we all say Green for Irene. Green is the ribbon color representing the cholangiocarcinoma that she had."

 

Benhke said that, sadly, he has too many family members and friends who have passed on who help motivate him each summer.

 

"One thing the Pan-Mass Challenge gives you is plenty of time to think," he said. "I call it my ‘pedal prayers.' They're not formal prayers, per se, but I'm always sure to be thinking of the people I'm riding in memory of. It's a chance to remember the good times, a chance to smile a little bit, a chance to be thankful for the people who survived.

 

Great Barrington's Whitehead has been an avid cyclist for nearly five decades. He got involved in the PMC after losing his daughter to cancer.

 

A cancer survivor himself, he rides the Pan-Mass Challenge alone, as opposed to being part of a team, but he draws inspiration from the community of riders that comes together each summer to support Dana-Farber.

 

"There's great camaraderie," he said. "You're sharing something that's very positive. This collection of people donating their time and efforts and money to a really good cause.

 

"One of the most poignant moments of my ride every year comes on the first day, I think just before the lunch stop. While riding you come upon a quarter-mile stretch of road where there are large photographs of young children who are all cancer victims. It never fails to make one realize what's at stake."

 

Local participants in the 2026 Pan-Mass Challenge (with links to their donation pages) include: