Five months after his heart stopped, he was back in the water for the toughest race of his life
Surrender was never an option for Mark Allison.
He refuses to quit. His friends and family refuse to let him. And now the heart attack survivor – less than five months after his heart stopped – competed in one of the most grueling paddleboard races in America with the help of his friends.
If Allison had just recovered from a heart attack and competed in a neighborhood fun run, that would have been a big deal, said his longtime friend Warren Ratley. But not only did he pick a hard sport, “he picked the hardest race he could possibly find and then the day we turn up for the race, it’s the worst conditions you could possibly ask for,” Ratley said. “The wind was blowing in our face the whole time, making little choppy waves. It was tough.”
But the challenges started long before race day.
Allison, Ratley and their friend Terry Smith signed up for the Chattajack 31, an endurance race through the Tennessee River Gorge that capped out with 500 participants within 24 hours, on May 1. Thirty-eight days later, Allison had a heart attack.
The owner of Surf City Surf Shop was on his board in the surf on June 7 when his heart stopped beating. His friends and fellow surfers saw him facedown in the Atlantic Ocean near 65th Avenue North and pulled him to shore.
Allison was blue and unresponsive when they got him to the beach and started chest compressions. A cardiac nurse from Chicago was on vacation at the beach when she saw his friends working on him and rushed over to provide CPR.
It would have been easy to fold, but I didn’t come to fold.
Mark Allison
“I remember going surfing that day. I don’t remember leaving the water,” Allison said. “The first thing I remember is them pulling the tubes out of my throat and asking (my wife) Laura what happened. They said you had a heart attack and I’m like going ‘no way.’”
Allison had a little more than four months until the race.
“The first time I saw him after the heart attack, he said, ‘Well, I’m still in’ and I said, ‘You do what your doctor tells you to do,’” Ratley said, with a grin.
Allison left the hospital with a stint, pacemaker, defibrillator and an unshaken resolve to not let the heart attack rob him of a second chance at life and the first chance at the Chattajack.
He just never slowed down. He never took no for an answer. It was pretty cool.
Warren Ratley
“We tried to get into the Chattajack back in ‘15 and they sell that race out in about three or four days,” Allison said.
“This year it sold out, I thought they said, in 17 hours with 500 people,” Smith added.
Allison spent 12 weeks in cardiac rehabilitation and started cross-training for the upcoming race.
“He just never slowed down. He never took no for an answer. It was pretty cool,” Ratley said.
Allison returned to the water in August and trained with friends in the ocean, on Lake Waccamaw, the Waccamaw River and the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway.
Allison, Ratley and Smith made their way to Chattanooga, Tenn., to check-in for the big race on Friday, Oct. 21. Allison’s packet included his race bib marked with a lucky no. 7. He held the bib inside his shop Monday as Ratley, Smith and Allison talked about the challenges they faced on the morning race of Oct. 22.
“It’s one of the toughest and hardest paddleboard races in the country,” Ratley said. And “it was the hardest year they’ve ever had.”
The trio had their work cut out for them.
I just wanted to finish that race.
Mark Allison
Wind and cold temperatures churned up by a storm in the Pacific Northwest made the 31-mile course through the gorge unforgiving. The wind and choppy surf knocked Allison from his board, but he got back on.
“It’s mind over matter once you get out there and that’s how I felt,” Allison said. “It would have been easy to fold, but I didn’t come to fold.”
Ratley was the pro on the prone paddleboard – a narrower board used for speed. Smith was the speedy one on the 14-foot board, Allison said. “I was there to finish and these guys were racing to win.”
Ratley finished first in his prone division, crossing the finish line in just over 6 hours and 44 minutes, 8 minutes ahead of the competition.
Smith finished 31st overall in his division, a contest field of 157 competitors, with a time of 6:12:29.
“I just wanted to finish that race,” Allison said, and he did.
He finished before the cutoff, passing more than 100 contestants who couldn’t go on, as he paddled into the loving arms of friends and family who cheered him every stroke of the way.
Emily Weaver: 843-444-1722, @TSNEmily
This story was originally published November 1, 2016 at 7:52 PM with the headline "Five months after his heart stopped, he was back in the water for the toughest race of his life."