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Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION
Running for dear life
Terry Fox Run draws many who have been touched by cancer
McKenna Didham, 20 months, dances to drum group Fubuki Daiko during the pre-run festivities at Assiniboine Park Sunday morning. (MIKE DEAL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS) Photo Store
Participants in Sunday morning's 32nd annual Terry Fox Run at Assiniboine Park. (MIKE DEAL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS) Photo Store
Carla and Steve Johns, with their children Leo, 3, and Edie, 5, holding grandmother Mary Anderson's hands, join the run. (MIKE DEAL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS) Photo Store
Some runners taking part in the Terry Fox Run show their enthusiasm. (MIKE DEAL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS) Photo Store
Participants in Sunday morning's l Terry Fox Run Park warm up before their run. (MIKE DEAL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS) Photo Store
Unlike most runs, Sunday's event was less about achieving a personal best than it was about clobbering the competition: cancer.
Even the younger set knows the goal of the 32nd annual Terry Fox Run. It's to raise money for research, says five-year-old participant Edie Johns.
"So people don't get cancer and die like Terry Fox or my daddy's dad," Edie said before the run at Assiniboine Park. She raised $250 for the Terry Fox Foundation by going to door to door with her dad and grandma, Mary.
She knows her dad, Stephen, lost his dad to cancer when he was a boy of 12. The youngster was also moved by the story of Fox, who ran so far on just one leg.
The Winnipeg-born Fox lost a leg to cancer before starting his Marathon of Hope across Canada to raise money for research. After running 5,374 kilometres in 143 days in 1980, he had to stop. He died in 1981. The first Terry Fox Run was held Sept. 13, 1981.
The 32nd was held Sunday and Edie, her three-year-old brother, Leo, mom Carla, and dad and grandma participated in it together.
Like most there, personal stories motivated them.
Teresa Convery, 56, said the run's namesake inspired her to get active.
"I figured if he could run on one leg, I could run on two," said Convery, who runs all the time now.
But it's not just about her. Convery lost her brother to cancer three years ago and her mom more than three decades ago. She doesn't collect pledges but makes a donation to the Terry Fox Foundation every year before the run, she said.
"It's close to my heart."
For others, it was their first time in the run -- and the first time to have cancer touch their lives in some way.
Amanda Cheys and Stephanie Berthon, both 22, said they decided to take part this year after Cheys' friend lost her mom to cancer and Berthon's aunt just finished her first round of chemotherapy for colon cancer.
For 20-month-old McKenna Didham, it was all about getting out of the stroller and running. Sunday was her second Terry Fox Run.
"The first year we went three kilometres before she started to cry," said her mom, Jennifer Didham. She and her husband, Trevor Didham, have been taking part in the event for five years, she said.
"We've both had family members pass away from cancer."
Sunday's event in Winnipeg was dedicated to the late Janice Dankochik, the provincial director of the Terry Fox Foundation for Manitoba for 11 years. She battled breast cancer for 14 years until she died in May at age 49.
Dankochik's partner, grown kids and young grandson were called up on stage at the Lyric Theatre for a moment of silence dedicated to Dankochik before joining the crowd in the Terry Fox Run.
Run chairwoman Carissa Nikkel reminded the hundreds gathered at Assiniboine Park about the competition they faced.
"We're working to outrun cancer."
The volunteer-run event won't know for a while how much money was raised, she said. Some people collect their pledges after they finish taking part, such as first-timers Cheys and Berthon, who didn't know before the run if they'd finish the five- or 10-kilometre run around the park.
"We're not sure," said Cheys.
Scenes from the 32nd annual run
Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition September 17, 2012 B1
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