24Hr Yogapalooza

Steve Neville and Randy Roffey, founders of 24Hr Yogapalooza, are at it again, keeping their fundraising event flowing with a little twist this year. The annual charity event supports childhood cancer treatments and research at CHEO. Pre-pandemic, the event consisted of 24 consecutive hours of yoga but has now moved to a virtual format where participants will complete 24 hours of yoga over 24 days. The event starts Sept. 24 and finishes Oct. 17, with one-hour videos by local instructors released each day.

“My son was diagnosed with neuroblastoma in 2010; it was Stage 4,” said Neville about his son Cole.

“If you know anything about cancer, Stage 4 is the worst you can get. CHEO was there from the very beginning. We started out with 12 hours of open-heart surgery. We had the surgery team and pretty much hit every single department in CHEO. Cancer kids meet everyone in the hospital. Cole had a treatment that was experimental. It was chemo, stem cell transplant, radiation, then something called immunotherapy. He is with us today because of CHEO. He is definitely a walking miracle. He’s higher risk because of the radiation, but he’s happy to be back to school. He’s such a happy and determined kid.

“We have a shared passion for trying to make it better for kids that have

cancer,” Neville added, speaking about his friend and co-founder of the event.

“The more people we recruit to come out and do yoga classes, the

more money we can raise for CHEO,” said Roffey. “There’s no fee to sign up.

We just ask people to try to raise as much money as they can.”

For more information and to register for 24Hr Yogapalooza, head to www.24hryogapalooza.ca.