A Stage IV Survivor Was the L.A. Cancer Challenge's Top Fundraiser

The UCLA 5K for pancreatic cancer research beat its $750,000 goal, and Peter Lau's page alone brought in $117,311.

Peter Lau learned he had stage IV pancreatic cancer a little more than three years ago. This fall, nobody in the L.A. Cancer Challenge raised more money than he did: $117,311, according to the race's own leaderboard.

The 29th edition of the Halloween-season 5K, run Oct. 25 out of UCLA's Wilson Plaza, brought in nearly $815,000 for the Hirshberg Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer Research and beat its target, the Santa Monica Daily Press reported Oct. 30. The race's online thermometer reads a little higher, at $823,448. That's 110% of the $750,000 the foundation set out to raise.

Organizers told the Santa Monica Daily Press engagement and fundraising were historic. The leaderboard puts a number on it: 1,964 fundraisers spread across 125 teams. Lau's page alone accounts for about one of every seven dollars.

He was this year's honorary starter, a spot the foundation hands each year to a survivor. In a profile it published in September, the foundation said Lau first showed up in 2024 just to support the cause, didn't expect to go the distance, and finished the whole 5K with walking sticks. He's had chemotherapy and joined a clinical trial at UCLA.

The race has a long memory of its own. Jon Hirshberg created the first one to honor his father, the event's site says, and its lifetime count runs back to 1998. Ahead of the 2025 race, the challenge's old homepage put that count at more than $11.3 million. The race's site and the Santa Monica Daily Press now both put it past $13 million.

The Santa Monica Daily Press reported that this year's total will help pay for the Seed Grant program, a two-decade-old effort that bankrolls new pancreatic cancer ideas. Each grant is $75,000 for one year, aimed at early-career researchers, according to the foundation's grant page. Sponsors cover the event so that all participant-raised money goes to research and patient support, the race site says. How this year's haul gets divided among programs isn't spelled out.

One earlier seed grant winner held a title at this year's race. Dr. Mark Girgis, this year's honorary medical chair, won Hirshberg seed grants in 2016 and 2024, and he's now the new director of the UCLA Agi Hirshberg Center for Pancreatic Diseases, according to the race's event page.

Next October brings the 30th race. Lisa Manheim, the foundation's executive director and the race's director, said, "We are here to finish what we started," according to the Santa Monica Daily Press.

Lau has lost friends to the disease over the past year, losses the foundation said drive his push for research. "Heck, I don't want my loved ones to suffer the loss of me either," he told the foundation.

Source: smdp.com, retrieved November 2, 2026. Other sources: pancreatic.org, support.pancreatic.org, pancreatic.org (2), support.pancreatic.org (2), support.pancreatic.org (3).