Miami swimmer powers through 5 a.m. practices, inspiring others to beat cancer

Two years ago, Vianney De Los Angeles — a Miami swimmer, triathlete and weightlifter — felt a lump in her breast after a workout. She assumed she had pulled a muscle.

That’s what competitive athletes do. Rationalize. Bargain. Train it out.

But a routine physical after that lump wouldn’t conveniently unknot itself led her to get an early mammogram and ultrasound.

As Breast Cancer Month activities in South Florida ramp up in the remaining weeks of October, De Los Angeles, 49, is sharing her story to spread awareness and to let others know: You’re not alone in this battle.

During the exam, her doctors kept looking at the screen, De Los Angeles said in a conversation inside her Kendall living room on a recent October morning. She had just completed a 5:15 a.m. swim practice with the Gulliver Masters swim team.

“I was thinking, ‘Oh God, why are they looking at the screen so long?’ Like, they’re circling this and doing this and the other.”

The physicians stepped out of the room. One returned.

“Oh my gosh, what is happening?” she remembers thinking. “I’m still not thinking that it’s breast cancer.”

De Los Angeles had no family history of breast cancer.

While still at her appointment, she was told she needed to return for a biopsy. She called her aunt crying.

De Los Angeles, who provides software and data analytics to the hotel industry, received a diagnosis of stage 2 invasive ductal carcinoma in February 2024.

“Valentine’s Day. A nice gift, right?” De Los Angeles said.

Doctors elsewhere initially told De Los Angeles she needed a double mastectomy. She sought a second opinion at the University of Miami Health System’s Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center. Sylvester surgeons determined a breast-conserving lumpectomy was the better option, according to UHealth.

Swimmers fight cancer

Like her mother, De Los Angeles’ daughter Dalilah is a swimmer. She was 11 at the time of her mom’s diagnosis and swimming with Coach Mike LaMonica’s Gulliver Raiders in Pinecrest.

Less than a year after diagnosis, in January 2025, De Los Angeles joined LaMonica’s Gulliver Masters swim team for adults. This July, she rallied about 30 of her early-morning teammates on a 5-mile swim fundraiser for the American Cancer Society. The fundraiser brought in more than $2,000. The swimmers achieved the 5-mile goal by swimming over 8,000 meters in a week in workouts that routinely range between 2,600 and 3,000 meters in a single session, she said.

Grueling for some. Impossible for many. And then there’s Vianney.

“We saw Vianney in cancer treatment in the afternoon and showing up the next morning ready to go at 5 a.m. There’s 200-butterfly tough, and there’s fight-and-beat-cancer tough. She’s next-level tough,” said LaMonica, 65, a national champion butterfly event swimmer in his 65-69 age group.

Masters swimmers

U.S. Masters swimmers are eligible to join at age 18, and there are some adult swimmers who are still training — or even competing in meets — in South Florida and nationwide over age 100.

Many of those local swimmers have lives touched by cancer.

“We all know somebody, or you have been through it, or you have heard of someone passing away from cancer. So, in us talking to each other, we learn so much about each other, and we have so much in common,” De Los Angeles said about her fellow Gulliver swimmers.

Last October, De Los Angeles was profiled by the SwimSwam newsletter alongside her teammate Kellie Feintech about their individual journeys navigating cancer.

Feintech lost her uncle to pancreatic cancer. His doctors suggested genetic testing for members of his family. Feintech and several other family members tested positive for the BRCA1 gene mutation, which can indicate a significantly increased risk for several cancers and, particularly, aggressive triple-negative breast cancer, which disproportionately affects Black and Hispanic women, as well as younger women, according to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation.

Feintech had preventative surgery. She calls herself a “previvor,” SwimSwam reported.

‘Long and strong’

De Los Angeles’ Gulliver Masters teammate Scott Mershon, who has been training and competing on Miami swim teams since age 6 in 1970, participated in July’s fundraiser alongside De Los Angeles.

“We are all inspired to train hard next to Vianney,” said Mershon, 61. “I would say we power through practice without fail, as Vianney had the Big C and beat the Big C as she was training side by side with the team. … As lifetime competitive swimmers, there’s no reason to complain about our training when others are affected with health issues and are still powering through.”

Mershon echoes a motivational line to describe De Los Angeles’ mindset. He almost assuredly had it drilled into his fins from his late coach, Al Sheeler, who was famed, or feared, for his strict disciplinarian style, visionary coaching, and push to excel in the sport at his former South Miami-Dade facility in the 1960s through ‘80s: “Long and strong.”

Exercise’s role in fighting cancer

Dr. Frances Valdes, a breast medical oncologist with the Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center, is one of De Los Angeles’ doctors. Valdes applauds her patient’s athletic lifestyle and said several large studies back the benefits of finding a physical and social activity when dealing with cancer.

“Three to six hours of true committed exercise per week does improve outcomes,” Valdes said in a phone interview with the Miami Herald. “In addition, particularly for breast cancer and for the therapies that we give — particularly whether they require chemo or endocrine therapy, anti-estrogen — it is particularly beneficial in reducing the side effects from our treatment across the board. It will improve adherence … which equals a higher chance for remaining in remission and cure.”

De Los Angeles said she went through about 20 rounds of radiation and did not need chemotherapy. She’s on a five-year hormone therapy plan and has regular screenings. She receives hormone blockers that remove estrogen from her body. The treatment caused her joints to get stuck on occasion. Painful. Her doctors recommended swimming to manage the treatment-related joint pain, she said. Freestyle is her stroke.

She jokes that she initially got into swimming about 15 years ago when she did sprint triathlons. “That’s what got me into swimming. I’ve always wanted to be a swimmer. But I’m from Jersey, and you know people in Jersey don’t swim,” she said, laughing.

“I’m not a super exercise fiend, but try to practice what we preach,” Dr. Valdes said. At every visit, Valdes says she tells her patients: “You will have a better quality of life, a better sense of well-being, and improve your outcomes with regular exercise. For stage 1 and 2, the prognosis, particularly with hormone receptor positive breast cancer, is very optimistic. We’re talking about greater than 90% 10-year survival rates.”

In the mid-1970s, the five-year cancer survival rate for all sites of the disease was 50%. Now it’s 70%, according to the American Cancer Society.

Breast Cancer Month events

The Gulliver swimmers’ July fundraiser for the American Cancer Society was a harbinger of what remains a busy October in Miami-Dade and Broward for Breast Cancer Month awareness events.

Among them:

The 2026 Susan G. Komen Miami/Fort Lauderdale More Than Pink Walk. A 5K walk or shorter 1.5-mile walk on Saturday, Oct. 17, at the Miami-Dade County Fair and Expo Center, 10901 Coral Way, Miami. The site opens at 7 a.m.; the opening ceremony is at 8:30 a.m.; the walk begins at 9 a.m.
American Cancer Society Making Strides Against Breast Cancer of Broward. A 3- to 5-mile walk Saturday, Oct. 17, at Amerant Bank Arena, 1 Panther Parkway, Sunrise. Opens at 7 a.m.
American Cancer Society Making Strides Against Breast Cancer of Miami. The signature Miami version is Saturday, Oct. 24, at loanDepot Park West Plaza, 501 Marlins Way, Miami. Check-in is at 7 a.m.

A thriver’s message

De Los Angeles said she’s sharing her story because she wants others to pay attention to their bodies and “get themselves checked.”

“It doesn’t matter what type of history you have. Keep up with your checkups. Go get checked every single year. Go get your physical. Because it’s good to be aware of your body.”

Don’t be afraid to self-advocate if something feels off, she said. That’s a point De Los Angeles’ doctor at Sylvester stresses, too.

“Even if you’re below the standard recommendation of 40 years, we’re seeing many patients in their late 20s and 30s developing cancer. So don’t disregard what you think might be a little bit out of the norm and also don’t let fear keep you from seeking medical attention because there’s so many good therapies. It’s better to know and know early,” said Valdes.

Don’t overlook the power of others for your mental health and uplift.

“Find something that you love to do and bring other people along, or join a community so that you’re not alone. A lot of this cancer stuff is mental, and if you don’t have the right state of mind you could get even more sick. You never know who you’re inspiring or who you’re uplifting by just showing up,” De Los Angeles said.

And, not surprisingly, Coach Mike, the butterfly dynamo, gets the last word.

“Compared to what Vianney was and is up against, most excuses are really just excuses,” LaMonica said. “I think if you can take on a dark 5 a.m. pool doing really hard stuff with really fast people, you can do anything: Heart surgery. Cancer treatments. Miami traffic. Well, maybe not that.”

Miami Herald staff writer Howard Cohen is a competition masters swimmer with Hurricane Aquatics at the University of Miami. He had surgery to remove melanoma skin cancer on Oct. 12, shortly after interviewing fellow swimmer Vianney De Los Angeles, and butterfly rival, Mike LaMonica, for this feature.

This story was originally published October 15, 2026 at 11:46 AM.