Alvaro Nuñez completed The Race Across America, cycling 23 hours a day for 12 days — fueled by a promise to his dad, who was undergoing stage 4 cancer treatment back in Spain. SUBSCRIBE to GMA: https://youtube.com/@GMA?si=ka34lqdEy8NRwJtT
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Seeing each other on FaceTime, where he was literally just waiting for me on a phone. That was one of the most emotional moments ever. And one of the moments that I was visualizing throughout the race. Of me crossing that finish line and seeing my dad on the other side. We made this agreement that if I didn’t quit throughout the race, he wouldn’t quit throughout the treatment. And when you have a bond, an agreement so strong you feel just unstoppable. I remember I was five hours in. I was so completely out of it. I was like a wreck. And I called my dad. And before I even told him anything, he told me, “Son, I have something to tell you.” He got diagnosed with advanced stage four cancer for prostate. And that he had to go into treatment right away. He told me that it was taking place at the exact same time that the race was taking place. So then I thought that was the answer. That was exactly what I needed to hear to drop the race and be there with him, because he’s in Spain. And he told me, “Don’t you ever, EVER say that you’re going to drop on this. You finish what you start. And just so you know, you give me more strength by doing this race than by being here with me.” He wanted to be a professional cyclist growing up. And the fact that he’s seeing his son competing at the world’s toughest bicycle race, it gives him a lot of hope, a lot of strength. We’re talking about 12 days straight of pedaling. I’m averaging 23 hours per day on a bike, and I’m sleeping an average of one hour. I’m talking about a course that it has over 150,000 feet of elevation. For me, it was about, how can I keep going while I’m still hallucinating, while I’m having this sleep deprivation, while my body is breaking down? Throughout the race, we were checking on each other. Like, I was getting notifications from the team on how he was doing. He was getting notifications on how I was doing. And one of the things that I found out later on, that was so beautiful is that every day he was going to get his treatment, you know, chemo, he was already telling the doctors, it’s like, “Hurry up, because my son is about to make it to the time station and this cut off time, I need to be there to support him!” And, “I want to check!” And so when you see someone that is feeling so energized because of your actions, that gives you the motivation to keep on going. And I’ll be honest with you, I had my lowest moments in life during this race. Moments that I’ve never even imagined was possible to overcome. But the fact that you have this bucket, this energy bucket of your “why.” Your dad’s going through this treatment, going through something that is also super difficult for him. That’s what kept us going. And we both came throughout the end of the race. He is doing good. He finished his treatment and now we’re just waiting for results. But one of the beautiful things about this whole journey, now we have so many battles to share with each other and battles that makes us laugh, makes us also see how real life can be. And how tough it can be. He didn’t choose to have cancer. I chose to take on this race. So, sometimes it’s about what you choose, but also how you react to the things that life throws at you.