Participants may cover the 1,86 miles on foot, by wheelchair, bicycle, or on skates.

"We intend to beat the record of 5,128 locations taking part in the Maracuba event and even have remote countryside areas participating in this race for life and against cancer," said event organizer Carlos Gatorno in a press conference today.

The race is aimed at raising awareness of the fact that a better life style can avoid developing cancer, and is one of the fundraising activities for research projects to fight cancer organized in Cuba.

The counsellor of the Canadian embassy in Havana Simon Cridland, praised the magnitude of the race in Cuba, the second most important after Canada, where over two million people participated last year.

On Saturday, Cubans will also pay tribute to Canadian Terry Fox who started the first race on April 12, 1980, 3 years after losing his leg at the age of 18 from osteosarcoma. The young athlete had decided to run from the Atlantic to the Pacific coast in order to raise $1 from each Canadian citizen for cancer research.

Fox was forced to stop the run on September 1 after 143 days. His bone cancer had metastasized to his lungs. He had run 5,373 km (3,339 miles, or around 23.3 miles per day). Soon after, on June 28th, 1981, he died.

He is considered one of Canada's greatest heroes of the 20th century.

The Terry Fox Run is the world's largest one-day fundraiser for cancer research.

(www.cubanews.ain.cu)