Marathon runner dies on the track

[Crouton]

Claire Squires was determined to "change lives" by running the London Marathon and raising money for a mental health charity.

Read more: Claire's legacy lives on after London Marathon tragedy

In 31 years Claire, a healthy 30 year old has been the 10th person to die in this marathon. It's a tragic event, and maybe 10 people in 31 years isn't a massive amount, but should they maybe think of really looking at the length and intensity of this marathon?

Things like this are supposed to be about fun and raising money for charity. If people are pushing their bodies so hard that they are actually dying then perhaps it's time to think about changing the course a bit. Or maybe having more extensive medical exams or something before being able to compete to stop the number of deaths rising in future years.

 

[wooly]

They can't really change the length of the marathon itself, it's a tradition. I guess the only thing that they could do is more stringent tests for those eentering the marathon, but to be honest sometimes these things are just impossible to pick up and detect beforehand. it's tragic when it does happen, but i guess people don't realise just how much people are putting themselves through running it. My brother ran it last year, and i never even would have considered the thought "what if he doesn't make it?", it didn't seem like a thing that could happen!

i think it is like the two footballers who recently suffered from cardiac arrests on pitch, one of them dying. You never know when these things are going to happen. It's unfortunate when they do but there's not much than can be done beforehand to stop them.

 

[Crouton]

I know it's a tradition, but that doesn't really mean it can't be changed. It was a tradition of Australian aboriginals to throw spears through each others legs as a form of punishment too, just because something is a tradition doesn't mean it can't be changed or broken.

I do understand what your saying though, things like sudden death are unpredictable, especially when the people are seemingly healthy beforehand. 10 people dying in the exact same marathon just seems like an unusually high number for me. There are marathons all the time everywhere in the world. You might sometimes hear of someone getting injured or dying in one, but 10 in the same one just seems crazy.

 

[wooly]

I know it's a tradition, but that doesn't really mean it can't be changed. It was a tradition of Australian aboriginals to throw spears through each others legs as a form of punishment too, just because something is a tradition doesn't mean it can't be changed or broken.

The problem is, it's an official sporting tradition. I mean... changing the length of a marathon pretty much makes every marathon record set for the past however many years somewhat invalid, because runners are now running a different race! It would be like changing the length of a football match to 80 minutes in response to the two recent heart attacks. Though in both cases, i think making the length shorter wouldn't help anything. The athletes would just perform that bit more intensely, so it would probably be exactly the same physical exertion. They are trained to pace themselves to perform at their maximum ability after all.

Hell, even the first man EVER to run a marathon died (according to the story). It's an ancient Greek story of a solider who was sent from a battlefield to Athens to announce that the persians had been defeated at the battle of Marathon, he ran the whole way and after he burst through the doors of the assembly shouting "victory!" (or something along those lines) he immediately collapsed and died. That legend is where they get the exact length of 26.22 miles, which every marathon in the world adheres to (although this wasn't officially standardized until the 1920's, with races before that generally being estimated to emulate the distance of Marathon --> Athens) so that's another reason why it's unchangeable. It really is a sporting institution, one of the oldest.

 

[Hilander]

It is sad this happened and I think things could be changed to make sure this isn't likely to happen again. I don't think you can guarantee it will never happen because some medical problems just don't show up until you put yourself under a lot of stress.

I am wondering if dehydration wasn't the problem. If so they could see that the runners are given more water.

 

[Crouton]

The problem is, it's an official sporting tradition. I mean... changing the length of a marathon pretty much makes every marathon record set for the past however many years somewhat invalid, because runners are now running a different race! It would be like changing the length of a football match to 80 minutes in response to the two recent heart attacks. Though in both cases, i think making the length shorter wouldn't help anything. The athletes would just perform that bit more intensely, so it would probably be exactly the same physical exertion. They are trained to pace themselves to perform at their maximum ability after all.

Hell, even the first man EVER to run a marathon died (according to the story). It's an ancient Greek story of a solider who was sent from a battlefield to Athens to announce that the persians had been defeated at the battle of Marathon, he ran the whole way and after he burst through the doors of the assembly shouting "victory!" (or something along those lines) he immediately collapsed and died. That legend is where they get the exact length of 26.22 miles, which every marathon in the world adheres to (although this wasn't officially standardized until the 1920's, with races before that generally being estimated to emulate the distance of Marathon --> Athens) so that's another reason why it's unchangeable. It really is a sporting institution, one of the oldest.

Well, that first person to die didn't technically run a marathon, he was a messenger and he ran a long way to Athens to deliver a message. Marathons in the way we know them didn't exist back them yet, they named the marathon after what he did. I actually love that story, I studied it in an art history class during high school.

I guess I just don't understand it because I'm not into sports and don't really get the whole thing.

I don't think it would be exactly like changing a football match just because of two deaths. There are hundreds of football matches all over the world in heaps of different countries every year, and the amount of people who die in them, compared to the amount of matches played is tiny.

I'm not talking about changing all marathons, I just thought they should maybe look at this one since 10 deaths in 31 years seems like a particularly high amount for me for one single marathon.

 

[BigBob]

No, I don't think the length should be changed. It's a marathon. So, 10 people have died from about 800,000 people that have ran the marathon? That absolutely does not warrant a change in the way the marathon is run.