Tragedy At Detroit Free Press Marathon

It would have been a cold dawn for the 32nd running of the Detroit Free Press Marathon this morning.

Thousands of runners were milling around in the dark, some wearing hats and gloves and leggings, others draped in garbage bags to ward off the chill air before the starting gun went off. My old running buddy was in it, running the full 26.2 miles. The weather was on the runners' side, and everyone would have been hoping all those weeks of training would pay off. But it wasn't to be.

It wasn't a good race, my friend texted me later. She was slow.

It was a very bad race for three half-marathoners, three men - ages 26, 36 and 65, who collapsed and died. Our sister station, WXYZ, reports that two died at the finish line and the third collapsed before the 12 mile mark.

Last year, a female runner collapsed and died during a Texas marathon. A couple of years ago, when temperatures reached into the 80s, a 36 year old man - a police officer - collapsed and died during the Chicago Marathon. It was later revealed that he had a heart defect, one he never knew about.

These tragedies make the news perhaps in part because runners are supposed to be healthy and because they happen during tremendously large, public sporting events. But I've never heard of three runners dying in one race. It certainly puts a damper on a day that was supposed to be fun for the thousands of runners and tens of thousands of spectators lining the roads of downtown Detroit and Windsor, Canada.

My heart goes out to the families and friends of those runners.

Comments

[Runtex]

First of all my prayers go out to the families impacted by the tragedies in Detroit.

I had a cardiologist appointment this past week based on an odd EKG that was part of a routine physical. He said that even though I run 25-35 miles a week and I'm in the middle of training for a third Chevron Houston Marathon, that a stress test might be worthwhile. I've been debating, but I think I'll go ahead and do the stress test. It can't hurt. Being a runner doesn't make you bullet proof.