Swim Across America – Chicago is making waves to fight cancer! Celebrating its 30th anniversary, this year’s open water swim is Saturday, August 3, 2024, at Ohio Street Beach in Chicago. The swim raises crucial funds for cancer research for the swim’s local Chicago beneficiary, Rush MD Anderson Cancer Center. Swimmers can choose between three swimming options: a half-mile, a one-mile or a two-mile open water swim. Participants can also join in virtually with SAA My Way. Land volunteers also participate in this inspirational event. To register as a swimmer or a volunteer visit swimacrossamerica.org/chicago.
In its 30 years of making waves to fight cancer, Swim Across America – Chicago has been instrumental in raising more than $5 million for cancer research. In 2012, Swim Across America – Chicago partnered with Rush MD Anderson Cancer Center as its local beneficiary. Since that time, the swim has donated $2 million to Rush to support early-stage cancer research and clinical trials for a variety of cancer types through the Swim Across America Lab at the Rush MD Anderson Cancer Center. Faraz Bishehsari, MD, PhD, a physician-scientist at Rush, was recently awarded the NIH Director’s Transformative Research Award for his pioneering pancreatic cancer research. This prestigious grant awards exceptionally creative researchers proposing high-risk, high-impact projects, and includes substantial funding. Dr. Bishehsari’s research originally received support from the Swim Across America – Chicago swim and this additional grant would not have been possible without Swim Across America’s early funding.
“I am extremely proud of how Swim Across America has grown and the real impact the organization has had on funding research and clinical trials,” said Catherine Gray, a long-time swimmer at the event. “I will be swimming in my 29th Swim Across America – Chicago swim, with my Team Russ, and I can’t wait to see my Swim Across America family and friends! We have all sadly been touched by this horrible disease – family, friends, colleagues. Sadly I have lost two of my original Swim Across America teammates – Russ Haffner, whom our team is named in honor of, and Amos Coffman. But, there is hope and real progress being made to find a cure!”
“This year, being our 30th year, is especially meaningful and important to us,” said Alyse Mauro Mason, co-event director of the Swim Across America – Chicago open water swim. “Cancer sadly touches everyone, whether it is a family member, friend or personally, yet, there are promising developments and real strides toward making progress for new and better treatments.”
Other 30 year participants include Mary Kennedy McCullagh, her husband Mark McCullagh, and brother David Kennedy. Mary and David’s Kennedy side of the family have 30+ members from throughout the Chicago area, Indiana and Michigan, who all gather at Ohio Street Beach for the annual swim. Mary, who is one of 11 siblings, and her husband Mark, have been involved with Swim Across America since the early 1990’s when they helped found the Swim Across America – Nantucket swim after graduating from Boston College in 1985. After moving back to the Chicago area, they knew they had to bring this inspirational event to Chicago, which had the perfect beaches and water for a swim of this magnitude.
“We are so proud that Team Kennedy remains a strong presence and foundation for the Chicago swim,” said Mary Kennedy McCullah, who today is the operations director for Swim Across America. “Mark and I, along with our families, friends, and fellow teammates have enjoyed watching Swim Across America evolve and grow during the last 30 years. Chicago is a perfect venue, a place where our shared passion for swimming and the unique mission of Swim Across America merged, and most importantly, through it all, we continue to give hope to those who have been touched by cancer.”
Swim Across America is a national organization and offers open water and pool swims in 24 communities, from Boston to under the Golden Gate Bridge. Founded in 1987, Swim Across America has raised more than $100 million in the fight against cancer.
Funds raised by Swim Across America and its grants have helped support the research and clinical trials for FDA approved immunotherapy medicines, including Keytruda, Opdivo, Yervoy and Tecentriq. Swim Across America is also a grant funder of the successful clinical trial at Memorial Sloan Kettering that was published in The New England Journal of Medicine and showed a 100 percent success rate in treating patients in a phase 2 clinical trial for advanced rectal cancer with dostarlimab. Swim Across America grants support more than 60 projects each year and there are ten named Swim Across America Labs at major institutions including: Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, John Hopkins Medicine Baltimore, Rush MD Anderson Center Chicago, Baylor Scott & White Charles A. Sammons Cancer Center in Dallas, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center New York, Infusion Center at Nantucket Cottage Hospital, UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland and San Francisco, Fred Hutch Cancer Center, The Swim Across America Pediatric Research Lab at Columbia University Medical Center New York, and at Meyer Cancer Center at Weill Cornell Medicine.
More than 150 Olympians support Swim Across America, including Kate Douglass, Michael Phelps, Craig Beardsley, Elizabeth Beisel, Missy Franklin, Ryan Held, Gretchen Walsh, Donna de Varona, Rowdy Gaines, Janel Jorgensen McArdle, Bobby Hackett, Ryan Lochte, Glenn Mills, Cristina Teuscher and many more.
To learn more about Swim Across America – Chicago or to register to swim, volunteer or donate, visit swimacrossamerica.org/chicago.
