The 2006 ESPY Celebrity Golf Classic, held at Lost Canyons Golf Club in Simi Valley, California, in a benefit to raise money for The V Foundation cancer research grants, raised $1.1 million dollars this year.

George Bodenheimer, Co-Chairman, Disney Media Networks and President, ESPN and ABC Sports announced this record-setting fundraising total at the event attended by celebrities such as National Basketball Association Hall of Famer Julius Dr. J Erving; National Football League Hall of Famer and ESPN commentator Joe Theismann; actor Haley Joel Osmont; 13-year-old golfing phenom Dakoda Dowd; Olympic skier Bode Miller; Motley Crue lead singer Vince Neil; and Hercules TV-series star Kevin Sorbo.

The V Foundation was founded by the late NC State basketball coach ESPN broadcaster Jim Valvano and brother Nick Valvano, with a goal to fund cancer research. In the last five years, the foundation has raised over $50 million dollars -- money that has gone to fund cancer research grants nationwide. The V Foundation is involved in advocacy, education, fundraising and philanthropy.

You can watch the ESPY Golf Classic, which will be featured on ESPN Classic, August 13 at 11:00 a.m. ET.

Quick autopsies -- or rapid organ donation -- may steer scientists in the direction of better diagnosing and treating the most lethal of cancers. Some 33,700 Americans will be diagnosed with pancreatic cancer this year -- and 32,300 will die. There is no early detection test for this disease and early symptoms are vague and may be mistaken for health concerns like indigestion. By the time the classic symptoms -- jaundice and itching -- surface, the cancer has typically spread and patients have only months to live. Rapid autopsies have been used before -- for Alzheimer's and prostate cancer -- but this a first in the study of pancreatic cancer and it just may lead to the discovery of what makes this cancer so aggressive and so deadly.

On Monday, May 22nd, 2006, the day before the 41st Annual Academy of Country Music Awards, Vince Gill will host the Academy of Country Music Celebrity Golf Classic. This year's event will be a fundraiser on behalf of the Academy of Country Music Charitable Foundation to benefit T.J. Martell Foundation, an organization that supports promising and innovative research and researchers for leukemia, cancer and AIDS.

T.J. Martell Foundation researchers focus on promising breakthroughs, new treatments and protocols that are bringing them that much closer to actual cures. Vincent Grant Gill, as a 15-time Grammy award winner, with 18 CMA honors, 22 million in album sales and president of the Country Music Hall of Fame, is a down-home boy who enjoys worldwide fame. Founded in 1964, The Academy of Country Music -- with more than 4,000 members -- supports, promotes, and enhances the advancement of the country music industry worldwide.