Dr Michael Ross, director of the Rothman Institute's performance lab, is used to helping local athletes reach their best. However, right around Thanksgiving of last year, Ross was working hard to motivate himself. He was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer. At age 42 he was shocked he had cancer, but took the battle head on with an aggressive treatment which included seven months of chemo and two operations.

Wendy Ross, Michael's wife, credited her husband with a determination to keep life relatively normal with his playful sense of humor, keeping the whole family positive. "He continued to work, and he exercised almost every day," she recalls. His son, Ben, admires his fathers courage as well to "not just give up and say - yup that's it. Instead you can at least have some hope and believe that something good's going to happen."

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