How the annual Terry Fox race came about

Just one more telephone pole. ”Fall down seven times, get up eight times”–Japanese Proverb.

Having lost his right leg to cancer, Terry Fox embarked on a cross-Canada run called the Marathon of Hope in 1980 to raise money for cancer research. His shuffle-and-hop running style took him about 24 miles per day-close to a complete 26-mile marathon every single day- with an artificial leg.

He managed to run for 143 days and covered 3,339 miles from his starting point in St. John’s, Newfoundland, to Thunder Bay, Ontario, where he was forced to abandon his run when doctors discovered cancer in his lungs.

He died a few months later, but his inspiring example has left a legacy. Annual Terry Fox runs are held in Canada and around the world that so far has raised hundreds of millions of dollars for cancer research.

When asked how he kept himself going as exhaustion set in and he had thousands of miles ahead of him, he answered, ”I just keep running to the next telephone pole.”