UH Manoa alum with terminal cancer fights to Ironman finish line

HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) – Over 2,400 athletes from around the globe recently competed in the Ironman World Championship in Kona.
Just being in the event is an accomplishment, but this race held special significance for a former Hawaii resident who fought for every step to the finish line.
For over 30 years, Jonathan Pascual has been an endurance athlete.
He’s competed in 16 Ironman triathlons, 22 half Ironmans, countless marathons, and even 100-mile ultra marathons.
Pascual’s love for testing the limits started shortly after he moved to Hawaii as a teenager in the 1990s.
“I love to swim and I was just starting to learn cycling and we have a cycling community here and we go around the island, and we started with that,” Pascual said. “My very first marathon was actually in 2005 with the Honolulu Marathon. Without training, I just signed up for it and did it.”
Pascual later moved to the Bay area after graduating from the University of Hawaii at Manoa school of nursing.
Then in 2022, he got a heart-breaking diagnosis.
“My cancer is called mediastinal paraganglioma,” Pascual said. “It is a neuroendocrine type of cancer. It is one of the, let’s just say rarest of the rare, wherein two to six people out of one million will have it.”
Pascual’s cancer is stage four and has spread to his lungs, spine, pelvis, and ribs.
Despite a less than 50%, five-year survival rate, Pascual was determined to stay active.
With the help of treatment and medication, he’s been allowed to still train and spent months preparing for the Ironman.
Due to his condition, he can’t lie prone for extended periods of time, which made the 2.4-mile swim the most harrowing part of the event.
“The longer that I’m in the water, my face starts swelling,” Pascual said. “Even my tongue starts swelling and it gets harder and harder to breathe. It was essentially a crawl toward the very end, and I was just really struggling with my breath, and I thought my head was going to explode.”
Pascual raced for his life and against the clock as the swim has a cutoff time of 2 hours and 20 minutes.
He reached land with just two minutes to spare.
“It was only that part of the race that I allowed myself to be emotional,” Pascual said. “I actually cried because, Jonathan, you actually have a chance to finish the Kona Ironman Championship because you made your goal of going under the cutoff.”
Pascual tackled the 112-mile bike ride and got to the marathon at 5:30 p.m.
After refueling, he started gaining strength.
“Going to the energy lab, I felt better and better,” Pascual said. “I said you’re doing the right job. You are eating and you are maintaining a pace, which is slow. However you are not slowing down like others. I started passing people.”
Then just before midnight, pure elation as Pascual crossed the finish line.
At 16 hours and 2 minutes, he says it’s his slowest career time, but it’s the best Ironman he’s ever done and he’s not stopping.
“This notion that when you have stage-four cancer, people write you off. People think you’re done. You’re given a death sentence,” Pascual said.
“I believe that is a myth and I am here to challenge that notion,” he said. “That’s why moving forward, I thought I come from a place of giving and all I have to do is simply do the things I’ve been doing all along.”
If you would like to support Pascual’s fight, click here.
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