On Sunday, Melissa Ward will put on the pink T-shirt and cap emblematic of breast cancer survivors, sit in an unfamiliar wheelchair and let her friend Annette Oros push her over the 5-kilometer course of the 16th annual Susan G. Komen Pittsburgh Race for the Cure.

It will mark the second consecutive year that Ms. Ward 32, of Aspinwall, a school psychologist for the Fox Chapel Area School District, has had to race in a wheelchair because of surgery related to her breast cancer.

Last year, the Komen race fell 10 days after she underwent a double mastectomy.

This year, reconstructive surgery on Tuesday left her too tired and woozy to walk or run the course that starts at Flagstaff Hill and loops around Schenley Park in Oakland. A plastic surgeon took muscle out of her back to rebuild pectoral muscle destroyed by the radiation she underwent after the mastectomies and original reconstruction.

"I'm not going for a third in a row," Ms. Ward joked, the day before her most recent operation.

The Pittsburgh version of the Komen races, which are run across the nation, had more than 35,000 registrants in 2007, and that same number is anticipated this year. Last year, more than 2,600 breast cancer survivors participated, and race Executive Director Kathy Purcell said "we are expecting even more than that this year."

The survivors come in all ages, shapes and sizes, and each of their stories of trial, tribulation and triumph is unique.

Ms. Ward's starts with the source of the two types of cancer found in her right breast: Genetic testing showed she carried a mutated BRCA 2 gene. When mutated, BRCA 1 and BRCA 2 genes increase the risk of breast cancer, as well as prostate, ovarian and pancreatic cancers.

Breast cancer progresses more rapidly in women with the gene mutation than in survivors without it. Those were the reasons she had the left breast, which at the time was free of cancer, removed as well.

The genes can be passed on to children by either parent. "In my case, it came from an estranged father," Ms. Ward said with some bitterness.

She is angered even more by the fact that she could pass the gene on if she marries and has children.

"There's a 50-50 chance I would pass it on, which is too high for me," she said. In any case, her doctors have recommended she have her ovaries removed before she turns 35 so she does not contract ovarian cancer.

She has not scheduled that surgery yet and does not know when she will. The subject is too painful for her to contemplate.

"Going through this is very emotional," she said. "Giving up my ovaries and not having children is something I can't handle right now. It's like being robbed of all things that make me female."

Ms. Ward turned to the American Cancer Society's Reach to Recovery, a mentoring program, but was disappointed that there were no young women survivors/mentors who faced the same painful issues. The mentors were older and had their children. She plans to go through training to become a Reach to Recovery mentor instead.

Before the start of the race Sunday, there will be an aerobics warm-up at 7:15 a.m., and a kids' dash at 7:30. At 8, cancer survivors will form a sea of pink for a parade up and a tribute atop Flagstaff Hill. At 8:35, the runners who have paid $5 extra for computer chips to time them will stage a competitive race. The regular walk/run starts at 8:45.