In 2006, The Endurance Trust began it's partnership with the PLGA Foundation to help them raise awareness of and funding for Pediatric Brain Tumor Research.  Motivated by the son of one of our friends, Ben McDonald - a little guy with the ability to truly endure - we have been dedicating our races in his name.

In 2009, with the launch of the Endurance Athlete Sponsorship Program, The Endurance Kids Scholarship Program and The Endurance Trust Competitive Memberships, you, too, can become a part of Team Endurance Trust

100% of funds donated to the PLGA Foundation go directly to PLGA specific research* in order to find kinder/gentler treatments for children with brain tumors and to find a cure for PLGA.

A Letter from the PLGA Foundation in Support of the Endurance Trust:

About the PLGA Foundation and Pediatric Brain Tumors:

Pediatric Low Grade Astrocytoma (PLGA) is the most common form of childhood brain tumor AND the #1 cause of solid tumor death in children. Yet there is little research or improvement in treatment options over the past 20 years.

Until now, there are no known causes of brain tumors and little complete/accurate data on Pediatric Low Grade Astrocytomas (PLGAs). In May 2005, families associated with PLGA Foundation and fightjpa.org convened a group of leading researchers and expert clinicians at the first ever JPA Workshop.

Their common goal was to identify new, non-toxic, non-invasive treatments, with no side effects or impairments, and a cure for those patients who live with Juvenile Pilocytic Astrocytoma (JPA) residing in critical, life-threatening locations in the brain. Defining a scientific agenda, strategy and plan for understanding these brain tumors was needed to provide the foundation for investigations of the causes for PLGA tumors. Armed with this information, these families, along with the PLGA Foundation, funded 7 cutting edge research projects AND launched the first dedicated PLGA Research program at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute. 

According to Dr. Mark Kieran, Director Pediatric Neuro-Oncology at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, "Dramatic advances in our capacity to diagnose, treat, and prevent cancers have brought us to a moment when scientific discovery and technology have converged to turn the tide in our fight against these diseases. YET, even with medicine's many advances, low-grade astrocytomas remain largely under researched and under funded, with treatments unchanged for 20 years. Little is know about low-grade gliomas (LGG) as attention and funding focused on these types of tumors has lagged behind that of high-grade gliomas. Without funding, there is no research. Without research, there is little hope for children diagnosed with PLGA."

PLGA Foundation(formerly fightjpa.org) families and friends have successfully raised more than $6 million in the past 3 years (with committments for another $3 million over the course of the next 2 years) to make cutting edge PLGA research possible.

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*PLGA Foundation covers overhead expenses through a single private benefactor.  No public funds are used to cover overhead expenses.