We’ve all done it – typed our name into Google to see who else is out there (or whether we register in some way!). I did this yesterday and had quite a shock. I had blogged about the London marathon back in April, saying how completing it was such a tremendous achievement.
What I didn’t know until yesterday was that a 22 year old completed the marathon, his first, then later collapsed and died. He, like me, was called David Rogers. The Google link above took me to his Justgiving page, which is now full of condolences and tributes.
David Rogers died from drinking too much water – hyponatraemia – whilst running the marathon on what was a quite a hot day. As a fitness instructor he was undoubtedly better prepared to run a marathon than most, but sadly and cruelly he died at his moment of success.
I write this not to be morbid, but to remind us all how precious life is and how suddenly it can be taken away from us. Generally we enhance the quality of our life by taking up challenges and subjecting ourselves to risk. In the short term the safest thing we can do is stay in bed – but long term that would destroy us.
And yes – this David Rogers is still intending to swim the pier to pier in July!