A fitness fanatic thought he was just having some ‘race day nerves’ before he had a heart attack at an event.
Ashley Whelan was training for months before taking part in a Hyrox race in November, having been interested in fitness since his late teens.
And the 37-year-old had ‘felt good’ in the lead-up, describing the training as ‘really good’ and leaving him feeling ‘really fit’.
With experience in Muay Thai events, the Manchester man was feeling a ‘little bit nervous’ on the day of the indoor fitness competition.
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“I started doing the race and there was some intuition that something in the background of myself wasn't quite right but I put it down to race-day nerves,” he explained.
“The way that I've trained my mindset through fighting is to ignore the inner voice telling you to stop.”
However, it seems that inner voice was really trying to warn him.
“I was pushing myself but not pushing as hard as I could've been. It was only on the last lap when I looked down at my watch and my heart rate had gone up to 220 bpm,” Whelan explained.
“My max heart rate I'd had was 190 bpm and I'd only peaked at that once or twice during training.”
Whelan then knew something wasn’t right and slowed down his pace with his heart rate slowly coming down too. But after he completed the race, he began to feel more restless and sought medical help.
“I told them about the pains in my chest and they put me on an ECG where they confirmed I was having a heart attack,” he recalled.
The man was in ‘disbelief’ while he experienced pain ‘like a ball of fire’ in his chest and was rushed to hospital.
Doctors found a blockage in Whelan’s left coronary artery and were forced to shock him with a defibrillator out of fear he may go into cardiac arrest.
He described this as ‘horrible’, comparing it to ‘running straight into a brick wall at 30mph’.
Whelan was then hospitalised for five days and placed on blood-thinner medication to help eradicate the clots caused by an arterial tear.
He was told he was ‘very lucky’ and he is very thankful for the team at Hyrox for being ‘quick with their actions’.
“It's still up in the air as to why I got this clot but when I've looked into it, deep emotional stress and high-intensity exercise can cause it,” Whelan said.
“I was intensely working out six days a week, working nine or ten hours a day and working on my house at the weekend. I think I was burning the candle at both ends.”
Feeling ‘lucky to be alive’, he now urges others to listen to their body.
“The mentality of powering through all the time isn't always the way to be,” he added.
Whelan's gym is now raising money to help purchase a defibrillator for its venue.
Hyrox told LADbible: “The safety of our athletes is always our priority, and we are very thankful for the fast response of our team and the medical team on site. We are happy to hear that the athlete has fully recovered, and we wish him and his family all the best for the future.”
Topics: Health
Jess Battison