The Great Drag Race took place on the 19th of June and was a HUGE success! 

What is The Great Drag Race?
The Great Drag Race is a spectacular new annual event that aims to radically increase the public's awareness of prostate cancer. Men of all shapes and sizes will take part at the event at London Fields, Hackney, North London, where they will each walk or run for 10.2km wearing a wig and a frock in order to drag the issue into the spotlight. That's one long stride for each of the 10,200 men lost to the disease each year.

Why is this necessary?
Prostate cancer kills almost as many men as breast cancer kills women, and yet 70% of us don’t even know what the prostate is. That's a shocking statistic. Men are dying unnecessarily because they are unaware of the symptoms of prostate cancer and because they are not aware of the risk factors involved. Experts agree that this is partly due to a lack of funding and media attention and partly because men are not very good at talking about such delicate matters.

What are we going to do about it?
We have teamed up with social entrepreneurs The X Foundation and the Prostate Cancer Support Federation to address this problem by launching Prostate Cancer Awareness Day on Saturday June 19th 2010 (the day before Father's Day). To mark this special day, we are launching The Great Drag Race and we intend to make an almighty song and dance about it.The Great Drag Race will provide a platform for men to show that they have issues, too, even if they have to dress up as women to talk about them! Through the media attention generated, we will encourage men to carefully assess their risk of developing prostate cancer, and we will do our best to get everybody talking about the subject so that men feel more comfortable bringing it up with their friends, family or doctor.

What's happening on June 19th?
This sponsored walk/run started and finished in London Fields, and the entry rules are simple. All participants were asked to do was raise money for us via an online sponsorship page (paper sponsorship forms are available) and wear flamboyant female clothing for the length of the route (or at least a bit of lippie!). It's that simple. We have so far raised over £16,000 for research into prostate cancer and support for prostate cancer patients and also managed to set a new world record for number of dancing drag queens! The Great Drag Race is open to men of all ages and abilities. The distance is 10.2km, but we want the support of everyone brave enough to take part, even if they can only manage the final ten yards. To help celebrate our achievements, there was guest performances, and a big after-party in the park for all our participants and their friends and families.

What else is going on?
If you would like to organise your own event for Prostate Cancer Awareness Day to raise both awareness and to much-needed funds, then please get in touch. In future years, we hope that there will be lots of events taking place across the country on Prostate Cancer Awareness Day, which will always take place on the day before Father's Day in the UK.
The X Foundation has also commissioned a feature documentary about this extraordinary event, and the film crew is currently following ten brave men living with prostate cancer as they spend three months training to become drag queens for a special one-off performance to publicise Prostate Cancer Awareness Day and The Great Drag Race. You’ll be able to meet the courageous cast on the X Foundation website from May.

How can I get involved?
We definitely plan to make this an annual event so keep your eyes peeled for information on next year's Great Drag Race.

If you are considering putting on your own event for Prostate Cancer Awareness Day, or helping us out in any way at all, please also contact the This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .
The X Foundation are also looking for celebrities and corporate sponsors who would like to be associated with this remarkable event, and hope to hear from you soon.