Brazilian rugby sevens star Raquel Kochhann is returning from cancer and ready for her third Olympic Games

She heard her number 10 being called, tapped the hand of a teammate leaving the field, and ran into position for Brazil with a smile on her face.

She made a quick sign of the cross, rubbed her hands and held them up with her fingers spread to receive the ball. And then Raquel Kochhann nodded: Continue playing.

That also seems to be her life motto. A deep desire to pursue her dreams has led Kochhann to overcome breast cancer, surgery and months of follow-up treatment to return to the top level of rugby sevens and earn a shot at her third Olympic Games.

After more than a year and a half on the sidelines, initially with an injured knee and then due to her recovery from cancer, Kochhann reappeared for Brazil in January at the World Sevens Series event in Perth. She helped Brazil reach the quarter-finals in Los Angeles, played in Hong Kong and in the series final in Madrid.

Now she is preparing for the Paris Games, where the women’s sevens will start on July 28.

The hardest person to convince that she would be ready for Paris in time was her doctor “because of the complexity of the case,” says Kochhann.

“He always supported me, but he was worried and cautious,” the 31-year-old Brazilian told The Associated Press. “To this day, when I get punched, his heart is in his mouth.”

Heavy hits are common in the compact, fast-paced version of rugby known as sevens (due to the number of players on each team).

Upper body collisions are common when players carry or tackle the ball, which can make doctors nervous.

Not Kochhann. She believes she has put in the work in the gym and during her recovery to prepare her body for everything the sport has to throw at her. She also received medical clearance from the team.

In a late 2023 social media post announcing her return to the game, Kochhann urged followers to “play every game like it’s your last.”

“This sentence sounds cliché, but we don’t know what tomorrow will bring. What if we don’t get another chance?” she posted. “Our fate is unpredictable. An ACL injury in May 2022 turned out to be a long-term breast cancer treatment. Learned a lot and personal growth.”

Rugby roots

As a young athlete, Kochhann was a dedicated footballer and had ambitions to wear the famous Brazilian jersey. At the age of 19, Kochhann tried rugby for the first time. She was immediately converted.

She made her debut for Brazil in 2014, won a bronze medal at the Pan American Games the following year and was with the host team in 2016 when rugby sevens made its Olympic debut in Rio de Janeiro.

Her mother was unable to attend the Olympic trials because she was dealing with breast cancer herself, but Kochhann enjoyed the support of her sister and thousands of new fans. The Tokyo Olympics were a very different experience as spectators were barred due to COVID-19 restrictions.

But she was determined and good enough to have another Olympic experience, even when, while recovering from her knee injury, she underwent scans for a lump in her breast and discovered it was malignant.

“Cancer wasn’t a shock, given my family’s medical history and genetics – and it could have happened at any time in my life,” Kochhann said in a business interview before the World Sevens Series. “I underwent a preventive bilateral mastectomy and moved to the oncology department. I had to put my career on hold and received chemotherapy to prevent the further spread of cancer.”

All the while, health experts told her to stay physically active.

“Even when therapy would take me down physically,” she says, “I kept believing I could beat this… and I did.”

Whatever happens between now and the end of July, Kochhann wants her inspiring comeback to be a message “that everything in life always has a good side and a bad side.”

“Our recovery and how we live will depend on which side we choose to look at. I could be sad, angry about the injury and then about the cancer, but that would take a lot of energy, and I chose to focus that energy on recovery. Always seeing an opportunity in every difficulty.”

One of thousands

The easiest person to convince that she could return to rugby was Brazilian coach Will Broderick, “who, like me, was keen to see me trained and back on the field,” says Kochhann.

Broderick, who has been coaching Brazil’s seven-team team since just before the Tokyo Olympics, felt he hardly had the right to judge Kochhann’s comeback.

“Because it’s so far beyond what you could imagine a human being could do,” Broderick said in a telephone interview with the AP. “We witnessed it with our own eyes: she trained hard through chemotherapy, through radiotherapy. She was at the training center every day.

“When she wasn’t training, she was at the training sessions and helping with filming and coaching. I’ve never seen anything like it in my life.”

Broderick always believed his playmaker would return, but acknowledged doubts always remain.

“There are so many things that could go wrong, but she is probably one of the most incredible people I have ever met,” he says. “Honestly, it’s phenomenal. Incredible. Then she comes back to train and how can I tell her… she has to push harder, work. Who am I to say that?”

But Kochhann was willing to push harder. The trade-off was that Kochhann became an inspiring presence for other players.

“She has matured and no longer gets bothered by the little things, like referee decisions or small mistakes,” Broderick said. “She’s grown in that sense and in the way she deals with little setbacks, because I think her perspective is completely different.”

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Olympic Games AP: https://apnews.com/hub/2024-paris-olympic-games

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