Marathon runner McCann dies
Monday, December 8, 2008 - 12:32 PM


Dual Commonwealth Games marathon gold medallist Kerryn McCann has died from cancer.

McCann was first diagnosed with breast cancer in August last year while she was pregnant with her third child.

She finished a course of chemotherapy in January this year but was then diagnosed with a secondary cancer in her liver.

McCann passed away at her home near Wollongong on the New South Wales south coast overnight, surrounded by her family.

She was 41.

She is survived by her husband Greg and their children Benton (11), Josie (5) and Cooper (14 months).

McCann won Commonwealth gold medals in the marathon at Melbourne in 2006 and Manchester in 2002.

"On behalf of the entire athletics community, I would like to pass on my sincere condolences to the McCann family," Athletics Australia President Rob Fildes said in a statement.

"Kerryn will fondly be remembered for being an extremely popular team member who represented her country on 14 occasions, across an athletics career that spanned 22 years."

Olympic great and breast cancer survivor Raelene Boyle said McCann was very courageous during her illness.

"Kerryn was a very strong person, very quiet, private, good mother, loving wife, a really nice, ordinary person who had an extraordinary talent to be able to, in my mind, stupidly, run marathons," she said.

"I mean if you had the choice you'd runs sprints wouldn't you, but she had this extraordinary talent and we'll never forget her."

Boyle said McCann did not let her illness depress her.

"One of the good things that Kerryn did, was she knew she was in real trouble right from the start, she knew it, but she got on with her life," Boyle said.

"She wanted to do it privately and she and Greg coped very well and they did the hard yards and the sad times together and they didn't really want to go into a public form of grief."

Former fellow marathon runner and coach Pat Carroll knew McCann for many years.

"To think that it's only two years ago [that she won in Melbourne]," he said.

"I mean we think about sport heroes as being immortal and you don't think that such a short time after achieving such a great feat only two years ago, that something so tragic would happen to someone like Kerryn.

"Distance running is an incredibly tough sport with the training you do.

"You're out there in the marathon for over two hours or two-and-a-half hours.

"You do do a lot of soul-searching and you've really got to reach within, and no doubt she tried her hardest to beat this illness.

"But I can assure you that the main reason she would have been trying to beat it is to be with her children.

"She was an extremely loving mother and I think that one thing I will always remember her for is the love she shared for her family."

McCann provided one of the most memorable moments of the Melbourne Games, duelling with Kenyan Hellen Cherono in the last three kilometres as they approached the MCG.

McCann was lifted by a roaring capacity home crowd in the stadium and pulled away over the closing 300m to defend the title she claimed in Manchester.

"I think Kerryn herself said she had decided that silver would be fine for her and they were running across the bridge and about to come into the MCG and she thought `no, I can win this'," Boyle said.

"She won it by just metres after running 42 kilometres - a very brave woman."