Overview The Pan-Mass Challenge is a two-day charity bike ride across Massachusetts on the first weekend of August, and every dollar its riders raise goes to the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute: $78 million in 2025, and $1.125 billion from its founding by Billy Starr in 1980 through 2025. Riders pick one of 14 routes from 25 to 177 miles, starting in Worcester or Wellesley and finishing in Bourne, Wellesley or at the tip of Cape Cod in Provincetown, and each commits to raise between $1,000 and $6,000 depending on the route. The PMC calls itself the nation's largest single athletic fundraising event, and its gift makes up more than two-thirds of the Jimmy Fund's annual revenue. Around the ride sit PMC Unpaved, PMC Winter Cycle and PMC Kids Rides. On site The ride is fully supported: food, water stops, lodging, mechanics, medical help and transport for luggage, bikes and riders. The course passes through 42 towns. Saturday water stops have included Mendon, Franklin, Wrentham, Dighton-Rehoboth, Lakeville and Wareham, and Sunday runs down the Cape through Barnstable, Brewster and Wellfleet, with hub sites at the starts and finishes. In 2026 Worcester hosted the Opening Ceremonies and the Saturday start for the first time, replacing Sturbridge. Off the road, Winter Cycle puts riders on stationary bikes at Fenway Park in January, and Unpaved takes a gravel ride through the Berkshires in October. Audience Riders come back. Of the 6,559 who rode in 2025, 1,553 had ridden ten years or more, 525 twenty or more and 20 forty or more, and the average rider raised $11,852. Most are local, 72% from Massachusetts, though riders came from 12 countries. They are backed by about 3,500 volunteers and more than 295,000 donations, and the PMC reports a net promoter score of 89. Track record The first ride, in 1980, had 36 riders and raised $10,200. Totals since: $1.3 million in 1990, $12.5 million in 2000, $33 million in 2010, then $69 million, $72 million, $75 million and $78 million from 2022 to 2025. 2026 was the 20th straight year the PMC passed 100% of rider-raised money to Dana-Farber. Dana-Farber credits PMC support over five years with helping fuel more than half of all FDA-approved cancer drugs and grow its clinical trials program to more than 1,100 trials. "We are inspired by the courage, grace and determination of the children and their families who we meet each year," said Michael Roberge, CEO of MFS, in the PMC's 2026 sponsor proposal. Brand presence Sponsor logos ride on the 7,000 cycling jerseys issued for event weekend and go up at every hub site and water stop, and sponsors can run a 10-by-10 activation at each hub site. The PMC also sells category designations, such as an official water that is poured at the hub sites and water stops, and adds exposure in the rider handbook and yearbook, on the weekend's TV special and live radio broadcast and through PMC emails and social posts. Sponsors' employees can ride or volunteer, and sponsors are invited through the year to the Heavy Hitter Evening, PMC at Fenway Park, the Opening Ceremonies and the check presentation.