Gabriele Grunewald Reveals She Has a Cancerous Tumor in Her Liver; Vows to Beat Cancer for Third Time and “Hit the Track Harder Than Ever in 2017”
By LetsRun.com
August 16, 2016
The eyes of the track world are on Rio de Janeiro, but some things are bigger than running. Cancer is one of them, and today 2014 U.S. Indoor 3,000-meter champion Gabriele Grunewald revealed on Instagram that doctors found a 13 x 15 centimeter cancerous tumor in her liver, which she described as “a metastatic recurrence of adenoid cystic carcinoma that I was first diagnosed with and recovered from in 2009.”
This is Grunewald’s third bout with the disease. The first occurrence in 2009 affected her salivary gland. Then in 2011, Grunewald was diagnosed with thyroid gland cancer, which she overcame after a thyroidectomy. The 30-year-old Grunewald’s comeback story has been one of the most inspirational in the sport, as she has returned strong to running each time and has continued to run personal bests — she set her 1500 pb of 4:01.48 in 2013, won the U.S. Indoor title in 2014 and set her 5,000 pb of 15:19.01 in 2015. She finished 12th in the 1500 at the U.S. Olympic Trials last month.
Grunewald said she will have surgery to remove up to 60 percent of her liver as soon as possible, but that may not be for a couple of weeks. Grunewald expects to make a full recovery within one to two months and said that the left side of her liver should “take over the space previously occupied by the affected right lobe and grow a normal sized, functioning liver within ~3 weeks.”
Even in the face of horrible news, Grunewald remained relentlessly positive and said she is committed to returning to the track next year.
“Getting rid of it and becoming a 3x cancer survivor is the new reality I am now embracing…There’s nothing more I’d like than to get on with the surgery, recover, and hit the track harder than ever in 2017.”
LetsRun.com and the running world are rooting for a quick recovery. Go Gabe, go.