JACKSONVILLE BEACH, Fla. – About 1,500 people helped raise money for brain cancer and tumor research Saturday morning by running or walking in the Waves of Gray 5K in Jacksonville Beach.
Logan Cake is 17 years old and is wrapping up his junior year of high school.
He is a brain cancer survivor.
Cake was diagnosed with a brain tumor when he was just 10 years old, becoming legally blind and losing some of his hearing during his fight.
He went into remission last year.
“In the beginning and being hit with it, I just had to take it and slowly process how everything was going to change and just look for the light at the end of the tunnel,” Cake said.
Melissa Cake, Logan’s mother, described her son as “resilient.”
“I have learned that he will conquer anything that is put in front of him, even to being in a coma for a few days this summer and in the hospital for 40 days and he was like I am going to school and he turned it around within a week right before school,” Melissa said.
Thousands of people raised money for people like Logan, through the Waves of Gray 5K.
The goal was to raise at least $100,000 to support research programs through Baptist MD Anderson.
That money would go to helping Nora Clark, who was diagnosed with Glioblastoma after suffering her first seizure in March 2023 and had brain surgery two months later.
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Her family praised her as a fighter and someone who exudes tremendous strength.
“They keep me fighting every day. I wake up every day, determined to beat this for all of these people,” Clark said.
Peyton Clark, Nora’s daughter-in-law, said hundreds of people have shown their support by praying, bringing meals and sending cards.
People who participated in the 5K got a T-shirt with a circle on the front. Within that circle, there are close to 200 names of people who have died from brain tumors.
This 5K was founded after Fred Fenton died in 2016 from Glioblastoma. He died less than a year after being diagnosed.
His wife, Dianne Fenton Waters launched this event hoping it serves as an inspiration for people to know that they are supported in their respective fights.
“I hope people take away a sense of family. A sense of community. A sense of that. They are not alone. Someone knows that they can talk to who knows what they are going through,” Fenton Waters said.
A big support system all with the same mindset -- finding a cure for brain cancer.