Height: 5 ft 7 in

Weight: 10 st

Heart condition(s): My heart troubles started in 1982 when I was 44.  I worked at British Aerospace at Hatfield where I and a good number of people played football and squash at lunch time or ran around the airfield.  I had noticed that my times round the airfield were becoming slightly slower, and after a few months I started to experience dizziness and even blackouts when running.  I did  experience some damaging falls.  A 24 hour tape monitor established that I had an extra beat condition ( tachycardia ).  Over a 2 year period this changed to a missing beat condition ( bradycardia ) with the heart rate falling to about 26, which in my case was just enough to remain conscious in an inactive state.  These cardiac arrhythmias had led to partial heart block.

Treatments: A single wire pacemaker ( Vitatron Quintech TX ) was fitted at Harefield in 1984.  Working on the ' QT ' principle in which the QT time period was proportional to heart rate, it attempted to match the pacemaker generated ventrical beat to that of the atrium and represented technology at that time.  I was now running on a regular basis because it was the best means of establishing my state of health, what pacemaker settings were best for me, and indeed what the pacemaker performance margins were.  From a running point of view, this restricted me to a 10 minute mile capability and I was not content with this.  After much pestering on my part, in 1990 Harefield fitted a later version of this pacemaker ( Vitatron Rhythmyx ).  The programmable adaptive rate algorithm in this model could be better matched to the patient, and I was immediately switched on to 8 minute mile type pace, achieving 48 minute 10k, 1 hour 56 half marathon, and 4 hours 17 marathon times.  However , over the last three years my performance slowly deteriorated to a point where I could not run more than 100-200 yards without stopping.  Was it me or the pacemaker ?  One of the limitations of the QT type pacemakers is the ventrical pulse is out of phase with the atrial pulse, a feature not present in the two wire devices.  In April I succeeded in persuading Harefield to fit a bipolar pacemaker ( Vitatron VID12820 ).  I have just resumed running again and my first impression is an improvement over the poor state I had been reduced to but not where I was in 1990.  Mind you I am 7 years older and my knees are not as good as they were !  An interesting feature of all the above pacemakers is that they have a 24 hour memory facility.  A histogram of the previous 24 hour heart beats can be recalled.  I used this quite often to demonstrate that the pacemaker was not performing satisfactorily.

Present training regime:  Because of the problems over the past 2 years or so I have not participated in many competitive running events.

Achievements:  my accomplishments with the pacemakers are; 11 marathons ( including 5 Londons, 1 Berlin, 1 Barbados ) and perhaps three times more half marathons, not forgetting the training miles in between.  A 48 minute 10k, 1 hour 56 half marathon, and 4 hours 17 marathon times.  A claim to fame is that I was one of the people presented to King Hassan of Morocco at the Harefield pacemaker clinic in 1987.  The rumour was that he wanted the latest pacemaker for his favourite racing camel !

Training tips: I feel that I need to keep both my mind and body active so I still work, at a desk job.  I recently bought a cycle to provide a fresh air and exercise alternative to running.  I play golf, but arthritic shoulders are restricting this activity.  Of the bad habits, I gave up smoking in the mid 20's, and am only a light drinker.  All my life I have quite naturally eaten a low fat, high carbohydrate, high fibre diet, with plenty of fresh fruit.  My protein intake tends to be chicken and canned fish.  Very fatty food would make me sick.

Thanks to:  My family for all their love, support and encouragement over the years.