RE: Sad News. Alberto Salazar heart attack

[quote]Caution Police wrote:

You bet it does - like an earlier poster said - running certainly contributes to a high HDL (good), but consuming tons of the bad fats and trans fats will clog your ateries just as it clogs the arteries of joe-six pack down the street.

Alberto is not the first elite runner to have a heart incident.

Brian Maxwell (rest in peace) and Andy Palmer (also passed) were not fortunate in their episodes.

I'm 46 - former D1 track and cross, with a terrible family history - both parents died from sudden heart attacks before the age of 55. My BP is great, but my cholesterol is creeping up - I'll take this as a warning - you should too.

My weight was giving me heart troubles high blood pressure.This is because of too much stress at work my nervous system was causing me to eat alot and I gain alot of weight from fast food.

I eat at home nowadays.

Now I feel much better from running. No fast food.

Henry

Ironic, Chris Hallinan, a guy Alberto used to race against in high school on the east coast had a full blown heart attack and a subsequent quadruple bypass surgery. Chris, from Bernardsville NJ( Same high school, Mark Wetmore coached) held state titles and records in the 2 mile and 5k.

He had this procedure in Sacred Heart hospital in Eugene many months ago. He too had follow up treatment at St. Vincents, the same hospital Alberto is in now.

His was an incident related to poor genetics.(Low HDL) It was a case of major plaque buildup. He had 90% arterial occlusions. Unfortunately not a case for stints as he had hoped. Chris had to be ripped open.

Chris is well, running his 5 a day and walking nearly the same distance every day.

Based on the treatment the hospitals have and seeing Chris recover as he did from being torn apart, I'm sure Alberto will be out and about in good time.

Hospitals are no fun and I hope Alberto is out soon.

A person's risk increases with any excess of the unhealthy items mentioned before, whether it's too much sodium in the hypertensive, or too much saturated fat and trans fats. So yes, despite running 70 mpw, limiting the sat and trans fats are very important, since risk increases with increasing amounts of those. That said, you can still have mono and polyunsaturated fats, and that will provide the essentials. I suggest no more than 15 to 20 grams of the unhealthy fats daily, no matter the mileage.

Weight, inactivity, smoking, hypertension, high cholesterol, are all MAJOR risk factors, and to say that inactivity is worse than smoking is debatable, since it is very hard to measure activity levels, to compare to smoking. It's attempted by epidemiologists, and they love that debate. Which is worse, to look at the 90% population that is inactive, or the 22-24% smokers? I say it is all unhealthy and correctable.

I need to re qualify my last statement regarding Chris Hallinan. He did not have a "full blown heart attack" as I wrote, but rather angina that was subsequently diagnosed as major heart disease.

A major heart attack suggests something more sinister and dramatic. This was not the case. That said, his condition could have resulted in a major heart attack.

My apologies to Chris for mis stating the facts as they actually occurred.

Alberto was and is a running hero to me and I wish him well in his recovery.

core wrote:

Ironic, Chris Hallinan, a guy Alberto used to race against in high school on the east coast had a full blown heart attack and a subsequent quadruple bypass surgery. Chris, from Bernardsville NJ( Same high school, Mark Wetmore coached) held state titles and records in the 2 mile and 5k.

.

Holy sh!t, Chris Hallinan? Is he still working with Mike Black and crew?

for whom does the bell toll?

I should add a few things. First, angioplasty following or during an angiogram--and this is what AS had--is vastly preferable to bypass. Not only is there the potential for memory loss, a consequence of being put on a heart-lung bypass machine--but also the potential for blood clots. I suffered one below the left knee (because the surgeon takes a vein from the left leg), which is relatively unproblematic, and one in my right lung, which, alas, is not, and these have led me to be on coumadin for some fourteen years. At the time of my bypass, my first child was only three months old, so apart from being hard on me, my poor wife had to suffer greatly. Second, again as a warming to everyone--angina, which signals some cardiac problem, sometimes involves chest pain, but very often does not. In my case, my angina had two elements: pain in my forearms, especially at the onset of exercise; and a burning sensation in my throat, again especially at the onset of exercise--that is, angina very often involves referred pain. Because the arteries expand as exercise progresses, one can experience angina, begin to feel much better during a run, and be seduced into thinking one must be fine, because it seems so intuitive that the longer one exercises, if one has heart problems, the worse one will feel--but this is not true. Third, do not be embarrassed about seeing a doctor or going to an emergency room if you sense something is wrong. And if it's clear that something is really wrong, for example, tightness in the chest, as if someone were squeezing a wet towel dry. or tingling in the left arm that just won't go away, do not hesitate to call an ambulance. Amazingly, so many people think they'll just have someone drive them to the hospital. The first few minutes can literally be the difference between life and death. When I went to the hospital, knowing I was having a heart attack--which turned out to be very minor--as I was lying on a hospital gurney and I said to the ER nurses and doctors that I was having a heart attack, they thought I was crazy. They looked down at this guy who has a typical long distance runner's build, clearly very fit, and they thought it was impossible. But trust me, it wasn't!!

I can certainly validate most of what has been said. Running may not prevent heart trouble, expecially if your diet is high in saturated and trans-fats. I ran in HS and college and for fifty years or more afterwards, did 21 marathons and never weighed over 140-5 lbs (5' 11") until I was 70 years old, then I gained about 20 lbs - still not anywhere near obese. But I suffered problems similiar to AS. Come to find out I had ONLY one artery that was 90 percent clogged with plaque, everything else was clear, but it could have been a killer, it was the descending anterior artery, often called the widow maker. I was lucky. I now watch my diet and am back in the 140 lb range. Unfortunately, the doctor used a medicated stent (they now think it may cause unintended clots), I'll be on blood thinners the rest of my life. It could be much worse. The relief in breathing and overall feeling was almost immediate after the stent was put in. FS

nice summary...but you meant to say the femoral ARTERY is cannulated, not the vein. If Alberto truly did have a full cardiac arrest due to the MI, he is very "lucky" to have survived and the witnesses who performed the CPR/EMS who provided ACLS should be highly commended.

wow, tough to handle on so many levels.

enough nonsense - by people who should know better - has been spoken.

best wishes and a quick recovery to alberto and his family.

Michael Dukakis wrote:

Arterial blockage or plaque is caused by poor eating. Exercising doesn't change that. You can be superbly fit and have arteries that are nearly clogged. Next time you're choking down a Big Mac, think about it.

exercise does change that. You can look fit and be fat on the inside, mostly people who diet and think they dont have to exercise have that problem, or people who are naturally thin. But to say exerise doesnt change that is flat out wrong.

I wish AL a speedy recovery as well.

This is a great thread on so many levels, reading about heart problems and conditions has really opened my eyes. Thanks to those who have contributed posts concerning heart health and its concerns.

Exercise doesn't and cannot change a bad diet for the better. The higher the amount of saturated and trans fats consumed, the greater the risk for developing CAD (coronary artery disease). Think about it, would you continue to smoke cigarettes just because you used your lungs with running? So why would you pour garbage in with those fats? I should explain, sat'd and trans fats are PREFERENTIALLY converted to the bad form of cholesterol, LDL, by the liver. Those fats are the enemy to healthy arteries.

The difference in lifespan between a distance runner and a sedentary person is only a few years. I read this in a study that was even published I think in Running Times..

When it is your time, it's your time...as awful as that thought is.

I for one am not gonna go out eating granola bars and hickory nuts.....after 30 years and 80000 miles...I'll have my transfatty fats and ice cream after a 20 miler on a Sunday..and Monday and probably Tuesday too.

I just really DREAD "my time" that's all-ha.

I feel incredibly bad for Alberto and his family. As a true fan of track and field I have not been this devastated since the death of Flo Jo. This reminds me of the when I first learned that Lance Armstrong was diagnosed with cancer. I have a passion for all of those athletes that seem to exceed the levels that we see as possible.

Ron Clark, the Austrailian multi-world record holder had a similar experience many years ago.

If I may, again, for whatever it's worth, three more quick anecdotes. As I mentioned, I had pain in my forearms and burning in my throat. I also just could not get in decent shape. So after two months (!!)I finally see my cardiologist. Given my family history, I thought I should have one. He takes an EKG, says it's a bit off but still within the range of normal. To be on the safe side, he schedules a stress test for me. Later that night he calls me. I dug up the EKG I took when I saw him three years earlier, during my initial visit with him. The two EKGs were very different, so he scheduled an angiogram. He expected to find one artery blocked, maybe 70-80%. I had three blockages of 90%. He schedules a bypass one week after. In the interim, I visit my in-laws in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and, frankly, I'm petrified. My wife and I go to the movies and I feel pain in my left arm and I think I'm having a heart attack, so I have an anxiety attack: I can barely breathe. I'm taken in an ambulance to an ER. I tell them it's my heart. They do an EKG and say it's normal--no heart problems at all!!! A second story. I have a friend who runs occasionally and bikes--he's in his early 50s. He calls me to tell me he has pain in his jaw when he begins to exercise. I'm immediately worried, because it sounds to me like angina. He goes to his internist three different times, and each time a new explanation is given for his jaw pain, but the internist says it's extremely unlikely that it's cardiac. I literally beg my friend to go to a cardiologist and demand a stress test and better still an angiogram. Turns out he needed a triple bypass!!! Another friend wakes up at night and his left arm is tingling. It doesn't go away, so his wife insists that he call his brother, who's a cardiologist. He says my friend should immediately go to the ER. After 15 minutes, his brother finally convinces him to go, but he is so unconvinced he has a problem, that he jogs a mile and a half to the emergency room!!! Complete denial. That day he had a quadruple bypass!! Thus, as for the view that when it's your time to go, that's it . . . well forgive me, but that's nonsense. The careful work of my cardiologist saved my life. I've been alive 14 years that I might not otherwise have had.

"We wish him a recovery as fast as his record-breaking marathon times," Nike chief executive Mark Parker said in a statement to Nike employees. "He represents the best of what Nike has stood for since the early days of the company."