The Forum

How come I'm just hearing of this? Two men collapsed and died (at different times, one man died 13 days after, apparently) at the Nov. 2 event and I really haven't heard anything. Maybe I haven't been checking the right places. I bet it was on RW.com, but I rarely check the main page there.

It's so scary. I was talking to Joey about it, and he was saying how crazy it is that those runners push themselves so hard to the limit and how awful it is that this happens. It made me wonder, how do you know if you ARE pushing too hard?

I push my body beyond where my mind tells me it wants to go, and sometimes beyond even where my body clues me in on where it wants to go. But not so far that I believe I've done any damage. But how do we know when pushing beyond our limits turns into reaching the actual limit--where you actually hurt yourself so bad that it results in SERIOUS impairment or death?

I wonder if these people feel the same way we do when we're pushing ourselves a little further, thinking that it won't hurt if we/they just go a little further. Or if they have REAL, serious signs that alert them and they just ignore?

I'm rambling because I'm honestly trying to figure this out for myself as I type.

Most of these people who die at marathons have a heart problem they are unaware of or they didn't properly train. Ryan Shay was an Olympic caliber runner and died at the trials last year because he had an enlarged heart.

If and when I do a marathon, I plan to have a thorough checkup by my Dr before I try to do it. The guys I run with on Tuesdays are marathon runners and they say if you train properly you should be fine. The miles that we've put in shouldn't be a problem because we are gradually working our way up and we haven't gone far enough for it to be a major issue.

Speaking of this, I refuse to go over 10 miles without a fuel belt and I ordered one on Friday.

I'm sure you're correct on all counts. It's still a bit frightening though.

I think I'm very conservative about the miles I put in and the way that I increase. Even for the mini, I'm training up very slowly. My goal is to get to 10 miles by the end of the year and try to get to 14 by the beginning of April. I don't THINK that's crazy.

I recently wrote something about me and the prospect of a marathon. I guess I could post it on my blog.

That was one of the first things I did when I started running, get the old ticker checked out that is. I know that I have a very minor murmur (that was discovered when I was in the Navy), and wanted to make sure it wasn't any worse, or anything to worry about. They gave me an Echocardiogram, and told me that everything should be fine. So far they have been right, but the way I have always seen it, is if it's your time, it's your time.

There are far to many other and more likely ways of dying to give up running, and a large number of those are from lack of exercise. I know that 2 people dying after a marathon sounds like a lot, but given the number of people that run marathons, not to mention the 5K's, 10K's etc, far more will die in an auto accident, or by some other means.

Oh yeah, don't worry about me. I'm not going to dive off of the deep end (I can't swim, anyway lol) and give up running. I just get to wondering how these things happen. I recently read that while running is good for your heart, the act of running is what it likely to cause a heart attack and it makes me wonder how people know when to STOP.

I guess it's different for each individual, and you don't know until you know, but then I guess it would be to late. So I guess I don't really know either. I just try to be as smart about it as I can, and try to educate myself the best I can, and trust that the rest will work itself out.