Great-Hearted Runner

While a student at the University of Vermont, Clarence DeMar was a cross-country runner of high aspirations and great promise. But after he won the Boston Marathon, doctors told him that he had "a weak heart," raising doubts as to whether he should keep on running. That was in 1911. When DeMar died in 1958, it was not of heart disease but cancer, and he was known throughout New England as "Mr. Marathon." For in the meantime, DeMar had competed in more than 1,000 long-distance races, including 100 true marathons of 25 miles or more. He entered 34 and won seven of the famed Boston Marathons. He ran his last race, of ten miles, when he was 69.

Medical researchers, among them Heart Specialist Paul Dudley White, wanted to know how DeMar's heart did it. Now, in the New England Journal of Medicine, Dr. White and Dr. James H. Currens report what they found after DeMar died. They had good bases for comparison. Studied by physiologists in 1928 and 1953, DeMar had shown only a small rise in circulating lactic acid and a small drop in carbonic acid after exercise as compared with a healthy man who was not in training. These muscle-exhaustion measurements suggested a rich blood supply, and, as expected, Runner DeMar's heart turned out to be unusually large and muscular.

But of greatest interest to Drs. White and Currens were the coronary arteries. These were two to three times the normal size, but far from being free of disease. Between the layers of the arterial tubes were fibrous areas and atherosclerotic deposits, some of them calcified. At several points, these deposits cut down the bore of the artery by as much as 30%, but that is plainly far better than the total stoppage that occurs in many heart attacks. The doctors cannot be sure whether DeMar inherited big coronaries or grew them by running. What is certain and significant is that moderate coronary disease did not hamper the performance of a remarkably vigorous and long-lived athlete. To the old-fashioned doctor's idea that heavy work or exercise damages the heart, Dr. Currens retorts: "It's probably the lack of exercise that does it."

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