As always when it happens to someone you know you pay attention. One of the BILs cycling buddies 53 and MTBing for 15 years had a mild heart attack on the Chase the other week. Details are vague but it seems he’s OKish and on medication. No surgery required. Docs have not said when or if he can ride again

So do you get any early warnings or anything or is it boom heart attack 😕

Nearly had one when I saw our M&S insurance renewal !!!

When i found out mrs cloudnine was pregnant with no.3..

come far closer to this than I’d like….

having a family history of dodgy plumbing, I experienced some post ride pain and then a few weeks later some discomfort on some climbs….. so sought advice… turned out to be a narrowing which would have lead to a heart attack ….. upshot is a Stent loads of med’s and back out on the bike just in time before winter reappears..

so yes warning signs were there, took action, patched up and making up for months of inaction…..

Not sure what constitutes a mild heart attack, I guess if you walk away from it then that’s mild.

I can give you answer to your question about warnings.
Personal experience was occasional chest pains for about six months and then “boom heart attack”.

I did go to A&E when I had chest pains and was thoroughly ECGed and checked over, I didn’t ignore the symptoms / warning but the “boom” moment still happened.

For me it was 6 months before I could get on a bike and that was on the flat.

Mate had one at 40, he could quite comfortably balance a pint on his beer belly, history of cocaine use, smoked loads. Went white a few times, then when he had a whitey one day and looked shite his girlfriend had had enough so phoned an ambulance. He went into cardiac arrest 3 times, defibrillated back to conscious each time, stented. He no longer smokes. Not what you’d call minor, but definately a boom after ignoring symptoms.

I always semi jest with my pal about should I keel over etc etc and carry a first aid kit which includes aspirin for such purposes. Also got my mate to download an app on his phone that gives offline instruction on how to do CPR as he’s never done a full two day first aid course. I just hope he never has to use it on me, nor I on him or anyone else……I have done previously and its knackering!!

So do you get any early warnings or anything or is it boom heart attack

It varies.

A good friend of mine died from a massive heart attack at 59, he was the only male member of his family to make it past 50 and that’s because he was married to a doctor and she spotted the signs of his first big attack when he was 50. Had another friend of a friend die riding up Holmbury Hill, he was a bit out of breath and just fell off the bike. In other cases you do get warning signs, pains. It does depend and also whether you take note of the symptoms. Best way is to get checked out and take an ECG under excersize.

sorry – exercise ECGs of very little use actually. A normal one rules out almost nothing.

These days we skip that stage and go to various types of imaging. Around here, CT Coronary Calcium Score +/- Angio if low-moderate risk, full coronary Arteriogram if higher risk.

In answer to the OP – some get warning, some don’t.

I know a roadie whose first inkling was a cardiac arrest on his bike. But if you do get an unexplained reduction in exercise tolerance, be it by pain discomfort or breathlessness, get it checked.

For the last two nights when I slept on my left side I could feel a mild sharp pain from an area near my heart when breathing (breathing in pain, out pain), but when slept on the right side I was fine. Last night was fine.

Freak me out so need to monitor it now … took some raw Tienchi Ginseng tablets immediately when I felt the pain.

Is anyone else getting chest pains just reading this?

A friend of mine, very fit and experienced cyclist, felt a bit unwell while out training. He finished his session and rode home, but after visiting the doctor, discovered he’d had a heart attack…
So it’s not always a dramatic, obviously life threatening experience.

Pain to chest / arm area (similar to as chewkw describes) can be other fairly serious stuff too, e.g. Spontaneous Pneumothorax (lung collapse) is one of these so always worth getting checked out if any chest pain symptoms.

I usually ride with at least one other guy trained in CPR. Just in case. They know the aspirin is in my wallet should any of us need it.

I ride with a physician so I’m not too worried about serious illness while out on the bike!

Ironically he’s the only one of us who has had anything like a bad incident, when he met a car head-on on a corner and dived over the bonnet, which could have killed him.

IME don’t ignore symptoms, be persistent…. the initial tests, showed nothing significant…further along they did angiograms which identified the problem. (after the 1st few twinges I made notes to describe what was happening as I found it hard to describe to the Doc’s and Nurses)

I have a family predisposition for coronary heart disease, whilst the fix has helped having a relatively healthy lifestyle has meant having some small unpleasant procedures, instead of a trolley at the morgue.

having some small unpleasant procedures, instead of a trolley at the morgue.

Indeed, a small price to pay. Best wishes.

Yep me, at BikePark Wales 15 weeks ago, on the 1st chuffing run 35quid down the swanny, on the upside I did get 114k off my critical illness insurance

dirtyboy – Member
on the upside I did get 114k off my critical illness insurance

Thought these only pay out if you’re branded terminal? Or was that the case?

I’ve had chest pains and some freaky stuff that ended up me going to A&E. They did ECG and bloods but told fine, go away. Did 24hr BP and was top end of “normal”*. Ended up concluding it was down to the amount of coffee I was drinking during the day.

I’m not entirely convinced but coffee is now down to mainly one a day (can’t rule it out, I love the stuff), general stress is down through lifestyle and work changes, part of which got me more seriously into riding. Rarely get the chest pain now and seems stress related, but with some family history of heart issues I have concerns and do worry about seemingly fit people suddenly keeling over with an attack when riding. Underlying genetic issues or clogged arteries in people otherwise fit? One thing I think I’ve never had tested is cholesterol.

* – noting that normal BP under NHS can be top end of normal and you’re considered perfectly fine, and yet in US you would be diagnosed with pre-hypertension and put on meds. Though there’s financial incentive there to do so 😉

Stoatsbrother summed it up well…. In my case lots of the regular tests either came up fine or inconclusive it was only when they went down the angiogram route that they found out what was going on

The chest pain clinic advised me to keep a diary of the occurrences etc which helped

But if you do get an unexplained reduction in exercise tolerance, be it by pain discomfort or breathlessness, get it checked

Is that the bottom line? Cos I’ve never had that, but I do get stuff like irregular heartbeats of varying kinds strongly linked to mild caffeine abuse in conjunction with exercise.

Is there anything I should ask my doctor for to be checked out? Seems very common based on the threads that come up on here.

Yep at 34! Sat at my desk one minute struggling to talk to paramedic next. Unexplained cardiac syncope (not sure thats spelt correctly), had loads of tests including the one that tests your electrcal pathway. No cause found.
Worse still last summer (4 years later) had a mild stroke confirmrd by MRI scan am conviced that i saved some damage as thought it was a whitey so laid down with head down hill.
Dont smoke, dont drink alot (2 bulmers is excessive for me). On mild meds for rest of life for stroke.

When 38 years old, I was at work, started getting pins and needles in my hands, sweating like a sweaty thing sat somewhere cool and it passed, drove home it started again, passed out at mothers woke up in an ambulance hooked up to several machines, whisked into local emergency dept and monitored for a couple of hours, then had another one so whisked from Weston super mare to Bristol heart unit in sub 20 minutes, 4 days in hospital, lots of tests, including exercise test, passed easily.
Blood test showed minimal salt in my system which caused the heart attack, took about 4 months to recover, was banned from bikes for what seemed an eternity.
Over exercising and not enough food, was training for Kielder 100 at the time, doing 75mile SS ride on weekends and 4 other nights training during the week

It is classed as a life affecting condition I think so paid out in full, we were with LV insurance took about 8wks to receive payout, I’m only 42 never smoked. My wilderness years ended a while ago, I’ve got 3x stents fitted and on meds for the rest of my days

tpo heart attacks.. only sympyton uncomfortable discomfort ( cant call it pain) at back of neck/shoulder, 2nd time left arm felt like someone had whacked it the day before.. sat up in a/e begging the drs not to jump start me.. ”i m sat up talking to you .. do i look like i need juicing up?”

scariest by far though a stroke.. perfectly well could not have felt better.. instantly went blind for maybe 30 seconds than double/multiple vision for about 20 minutes then vertigo.. not pleasnat at all and scary as ****

That Kanye West set just about set one off.