This is a story about my dad...an ultra-
endurance athlete who literally almost
DIED because of chronic inflammation.

I've never really talked about this before here...and I think
it'll be an eye-opener for a lot of people...

... ESPECIALLY if you train hard and eat right and THINK
you're immune to a lot of the issues that hit sedentary
people who DON'T eat right.

This is important stuff and and a bit of a longer email but
I really hope you'll read it all the way through.

First, a little background...my dad (Alex Nilsson) is one of
the most incredibly determined endurance athletes I've
ever seen in my life.

To give you an idea, in 2005, he roller skied ACROSS
CANADA in 3 months...at 70 YEARS OF AGE.



He's done 40 hour-straight endurance bike rides and
24 hour mountain bike races...he's also done 24 hour
golf marathons (no cart...carrying his own clubs...200
holes in 24 hours).

THAT is the ultra-endurance thing that I'm talking about.

So it was January 2005, the Phoenix Marathon down in
Arizona. His personal challenge at the time was to do a
marathon a month for 12 months in a row. He was on
marathon #7.

The training he was doing at the time was nothing short
of astonishing. He would literally spend HOURS every day
doing various endurance activities...running, cycling, roller
skiing, etc. It was hard to believe a person could even do
all those things at ANY age!


And this insane training was what would
catch up to him during the marathon...

The day of the marathon was a nice sunny day...not too
hot...he was feeling a little under the weather but decided
to still run it anyways, taking it easy (i.e. 4 hour pace ;).

It was Mile 25...almost within sight of the finish line...when
it happened...

He started to stumble...he threw up a couple of times. A
few people came over and asked him if they could help
and if he was ok.

Well, being the stubborn Swede that he is, he brushed them
off and said "I'm fine...my wife is a nurse. She'll take care of
me when the race is done."

And he kept going...

Because as he was running down the road, stumbling
and struggling to keep going...he was in atrial fibrilation,
having a heart attack.

My dad...the ultra-endurance athlete who was in the best shape
of ANYBODY I had ever known in my entire life...who ate
incredibly clean and healthy...who never smoked or drank...
was having a heart attack.

It still chokes me up to this very day to think about it, much
less write about it.

To this day, I'm thankful to those people who saw him having
these issues and notified an ambulance crew that was nearby.

It's tough to say, but most people who have a heart attack
during a marthon, quite frankly, die.

But on THIS day, the ambulance crew came over to him and
tried to help him. Again, he refused assistance and kept going.

Knowing full well there was something really wrong, they got in
their ambulance and FOLLOWED him down the road as he
was running.

Yes, he literally had an ambulance trailing 20 yards behind
him as he was RUNNING down Scottsdale Road, in atrial
fibriliation, having a heart attack.


You think you're stubborn? That sets a new standard... ;)

When he finally collapsed, the ambulance crew jumped out,
and had the debriliator on him within SECONDS.

He was airlifted to the hospital and went through surgery to
remove the blockage...and after several months of grudgingly
following doctors orders to rest, he gradually worked back to
training and got himself off ALL the medications that most
people end up having to take for the rest of their lives.

He made it through and he's doing great to this day.


So where does chronic inflammation fit in to this story?

I'll tell you...

When you train, your body kicks off all kinds of free radicals in
response...inflammation levels in your body go up.

For most people, if they eat well, their bodies can deal fairly
well with a small amount of inflammation.

My dad was eating VERY well...but the sheer amount of
MASSIVE training volume he was putting himseslf through
(without adequate recovery) was producing ENORMOUS
amounts of inflammation. More than his body could deal with.

And this culminated in inflamed coronary arteries....which
forced a piece of arterial plaque to break off during the
marathon, causing the clot, which caused the heart attack.

He was the person that you would never suspect to have a
heart attack. Literally NEVER.

Yet chronic inflammation and lack of recovery almost ended his life.

---

Now, as powerful as this story is, yes, it is an extreme
example. Most people aren't going to train at that
level for that long (that's for sure!).

However...chronic inflammation does play a BIG role in YOUR
overall quality of life...

Nick Nilsson
The "Mad Scientist of Muscle"