But as the sun shimmered off Lake Michigan on Sunday morning, she was there as "Team Lo Lo" joined a vast sea of pink and white along Lincoln Memorial Drive.
Kyte, whose nickname is Lo Lo, has walked the race at least six times. This year, 1 million people are expected to participate worldwide.
In Milwaukee, about 13,000 runners and walkers raised nearly $1 million, according to organizers. Local organizers had expected to raise $1.25 million, but they attributed the decline this year to the economy. Participation is still expected to be up slightly from 12,731 last year.
At the starting line, the serious runners in the 3.1-mile, 5K run took off like a shot. They are the exception. Only about 1,000 of the crowd of 13,000 participated in the timed race.
For the rest, the event is less a race and more a portrait of survival.
Of all of the runners, 1,000 were breast cancer survivors. That's a record, according to spokeswoman Mary Scheidler.
"That's what we like to see," Scheidler said. "We want that number to get bigger every year."
Pink race T-shirts signified those who have experienced breast cancer - currently, one in eight women in the United States is diagnosed with the disease.
Kyte, 69, of Brown Deer, the mother of six children, is a survivor. But it's been a struggle.
She has had cancer return four times since her initial diagnosis in 1998. On Sunday, she wore a pink scarf to cover her head because of recent radiation treatments.
Doctors found that the cancer had metastasized in her brain. She'll soon start chemotherapy.
"That was a blow," she said before the race. "But you almost always know that it's going to come back."
Team Lo Lo gathered under a tent sponsored by Laacke & Joys. When she arrived, Kyte, who is on medical leave as a teacher's aide at Stormonth School in Fox Point, was greeted by hugs and tears.
"This is a day to come together and support my mother for all that she has gone through," said Lynne Keckeisen, 44.
Team Lo Lo has other members who have been diagnosed with breast cancer. Friends have died from the disease.
Ironically, Kyte's physical battles have helped the team grow and lend help to the cause in other ways.
Members raised more than $4,500 this year.
Keckeisen's company, Allegra Printing & Imaging of Milwaukee, donated graphic and design work for placemats for breast cancer awareness month in October. The placemats will be distributed at McDonald's restaurants in southeastern Wisconsin.
Another daughter, Beth Kyte, has been a volunteer on the race committee for five years.
And for race day, Keckeisen's 14-year-old daughter, Emma, had her braces tightened with pink string.
Long after the runners sprinted away, Kyte, her husband, Dave, and another daughter, Suzanne, walked arm-and-arm as another son carried Team Lo Lo's sign.
She was, by her own, description, "weak and shaky."
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