Relay for Life Mayo raises close to €130,000 for Irish Cancer Society

Relay for Life Mayo has just had its biggest ever fundraising weekend. When all the money is collected, it is expected that the total amount raised will exceed €130,000. 

This is a huge amount of money and is testament to the generosity of the people of Mayo, as well as the huge amount of unseen work that goes on behind the scenes by the event’s volunteers, fundraising teams and in particular, the organising committee. 

READ MORE: Hundreds of people to take part in Relay for Life Mayo this weekend

The money raised will fund the provision of vital services in Mayo, such as night nurse assistance to facilitate support of people in their own homes, counselling sessions for people affected by cancer, supportive conversations with support nurses on the helpline and transportation for people to get to their chemotherapy appointments. 

One of the members of the organising committee, Cllr Peter Flynn, was very pleased that teams from all over the county took part in the twenty four hour relay. He explained that “we have changed it from Relay for Life Westport to Relay for Life Mayo to try and make it more of a Mayo event than a Westport-centric event. There were teams from all over - Ballina, Castlebar, Ballyhaunis, Killala, as well as the wider Westport area.”

This may explain why a record twenty three teams took part this year, up from fourteen last year. 

The Candle of Hope Ceremony on Saturday evening was a breath-taking experience as the sky above the Mall in Westport was lit up with personal messages of hope and remembrance from cancer survivors and their family and friends, as well as those currently fighting cancer.

This was also be the first year that there will be an autism-friendly sensory tent. 

As well as the hundreds of people who walked as part of the relay, there was also yoga on the Fairgreen, Irish dancing and brilliant musicians taking part, including the Ceol na Cruaiche U12 céilí band. 

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Cllr Flynn was full of praise for the musicians and "the amount of voluntary work that went into making it happen. Everyone rolled up their sleaves and all the staging was provided free of charge."

The final figures from the phenomenal fundraising teams will be totted up in the coming weeks.

Last year, the €80,000 raised paid for 307 nights of nursing care in Mayo, to allow patients at the end of their life to spend their final days surrounded by their loved ones, 319 free counselling sessions for those affected by cancer in Mayo, 340 free drives to bring 55 patients in Mayo to and from cancer treatment and 478 supportive and comforting conversations with people affected by cancer through the Irish Cancer Society Support Line and Daffodil Centre nurses in Mayo. 

The table below shows the online fundraising totals by the teams at the time of publication. These figures are not the total figures as they do not include bucket collections and other donations. 

The relay teams who took part in the 2025 event include: