Celebrating more than a decade of impact and adventure with the Seven7 Drive for kids with cancer
Seven hospitals over seven days, covering 7,000km across seven Southern African countries, to deliver gifts and messages of hope to kids fighting cancer. It’s this audacious idea that provided the spark for an adventure that would, over the next decade, become the annual Seven7 Drive in aid of kids with cancer. This September, 11 years since the inaugural Drive, the Seven7 Drive is preparing to set off on the next adventure.
“It’s hard to believe that the Seven7 Drive has been going for more than a decade, and that it’s evolved from an adventure-driven passion project to a non-profit organisation focused on making an impact on more and more lives each year,” says Danie Botha, co-founder of the Seven7 Drive project and the ‘Managing Driver’ of the Seven7 Drive NPC. “Every year, irrespective of the hospital we visit, our resolve grows stronger and we believe that 2026 will be the Drive’s biggest and most impactful iteration yet”.
Scheduled to depart from the Steve Biko Academic Hospital in the City of Tshwane on 24 September 2026, this year’s Seven7 Drive sees the crew returning to the original starting point from the inaugural drive in 2015.
That very first trip, piloting a then-new Kia Sorento in entry-level, two-wheel drive configuration, saw the crew travel through Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, eSwatini and Lesotho before returning to South Africa. Long days, often challenging roads and ever-increasing fatigue became the norm, but the three-man crew persisted: a hospital or clinic was visited in each country, a message of hope and encouragement delivered to each child, and a smile left behind with a gift pack.
“When the idea of the Seven7 Drive was first pitched, Christo was heading up PR and marketing at Kia and didn’t hesitate to say yes. He shared the passion for adventure and for making an impact, and each year selected a vehicle from the range that was the antithesis of an overlanding vehicle,” Botha recalls. “It became a bit of a running joke for us in the early years but reminded us of the resilience of the human spirit. If kids can fight and overcome cancer, covering nearly 7,000km in a car that is not engineered for such terrain was a daily reminder to stay grounded in our mission.”
By 2019, the Seven7 Drive implemented its first strategic shift in focus as the organisers – by then all still passionate volunteers – moved to transform the Seven7 Drive from a cross-border overland adventure to a national childhood cancer platform. Opting to maximise impact within the borders of South Africa, the Drive transitioned to focus on seven South African cities and hospitals over seven days, a change which made it possible to foster long-term relationships with the hospitals visited each year while making it easier and more realistic to include media and sponsor involvement in a tangible way.
By 2024, emboldened by the need to further amplify the message around the prevalence of childhood cancer and the need to further raise awareness around the benefits of early detection, a second strategic shift took place: the Seven7 Drive moved from an annual passion project to a registered non-profit company.
The new four-member board structure, which includes Botha as the ‘Managing Driver’ and Christo Valentyn as the ‘Marketing Driver’, deliberately combined creative, marketing, corporate affairs and project expertise with the aim of transitioning the Drive from limited annual activities to one that opens participation options to more sponsors and participants. Simply, the Seven7 Drive wanted to reach even more children and create even greater tangible impact.
Two years later, the fruit of the labour is becoming evident: the 2026 edition of the annual Seven7 Drive is set to be the biggest and most impactful iteration of the Drive yet.
The focus on childhood cancer will always remain the ‘true north’ of the organisation, and the inherent executional concept of the Seven7 Drive will remain intact for 2026. However, this year will see the Seven7 Drive embark with new partners, on a new route and with renewed focus.
“Danie and I share the belief that anything is possible with passion, persistence and perseverance, and it’s exactly these qualities that fuel our dreams of what Seven7 could become and keeps us going each year,” comments Valentyn. “Passion and conviction are infectious characteristics, and we are grateful that, with each passing year, more people and partners are stepping up to help us build the impact of the Drive.
“In a world in which basic needs are increasingly not being met across multiple vulnerable communities, we see our mandate shifting into broader community upliftment projects. Where we can identify synergies and alignment on the focus of leaving the world in a better position than before, we will partner with other charitable organisations to bring projects to life in tangible, measurable, meaningful and memorable ways.”
More details on the 2026 Seven7 Drive for kids with cancer will be released over the next two weeks, including the announcement of new partners and sponsors and a superstar production crew that will bring the Drive to life through a dedicated television special.
