Good news is that he hit the deck already dead (full cardiac arrest) and because there were 3 nurses in the class (one of them being his wife) they started CPR on him immediately, someone ran for a lifeguard in the pool with a defibrilator and after 5 minutes of keeping him alive with CPR and chest compressions, they shocked his heart back to life.
Here is a link in today's paper on it:
http://www.ottawasun.com/News/Ottawa...80318-sun.html
I went to visit him today in the ICU and his wife and another person who was at the class said the newspaper story got it wrong. While the lifeguard adminstered the defibrilator, it was the class members who kept him alive with the CPR and the compressions. The paramedics said that without it the defib would not have done anything.
The instructor looks great (we were joking and laughing the whole time today) he's going for an angiogram tomorrow and may get angioplasty (baloon out the clot/plaque) and /or a stent or possibly even a bypass.
He says btw that there is nothing on the other side, nada.
His family has a real lousy history of heart problems young, he had been taking statins to lower high cholesterol since 1992, his BP was boderline high and they were considering starting him on meds for it (before all this happened), he was scheduled for a stress test next week. 6ft 210lbs in great shape.
4,000kms on the road bike this summer (short season in Ottawa) and teaching 3 or 4 spinning classes a week (my fav instructor btw). They gave him a cardiac diet plan when I was in the room with him today and he looks at it, hands it to his wife and they both say thats what they eat already, not many changes needed on that end.
He arrested in an instant and hit the deck while still clipped onto the bike with his look shoes and pedals.
He hit his head under the ear on a table and needed 6 stitches but did not hit his head too badly. One of his legs did not release off the pedal when he fell and somehow that resulted in a really nasty bruise in his calf. He is in almost no chest pain from the heart but needs big doses of pain meds for his calf. Plus they have him on blood thinners which is not helping.
You never know what is around the corner in this life.
Just glad he's still here.