Well, here I am one week post-op after a x6 cardiac bypass surgery. In recent years, my risk per lipid, c-reactive protein, and hoomcysteine testing was in the much lower than normal category. However decades prior of a high stress job and bad dietary habits probably laid the groundwork for the blockage. I had completed a spinning class training program with a motivated group including triathletes from last September through late April and ex-pro cyclist leader had us on a progressive program that included sprinting and hill climbing sections that often kept my heart rate in or near the max zone. I thought that was a good litmus test for cardiac health. It wasn't. This May, when I returned to outside riding, I found that hills that I breezed last year were now resulting in shortness of breath and an achy throat. I thought I was developing exercise induced asthma. Well, I found out the evening of June 3 during a team tennis match at an away club that it was my heart. I went down in the second set and when the lights came back on I was staring up at many faces. In response to my "what happened," a rescue squad guy bellowed down, "Your heart stopped!" the good news (miraculous) is that a cardiologist was playing two courts over for the opposing side. He immediately initiated world class cpr and was soon aided by a pediatric intensivist who was playing somewhere else in the building. They kept my vital organs and brain perfused with blood and oxygen for the 12 minutes it took for the rescue squad to arrive and shock me out of v-fib (not consistent with life) with a defibrillator. Both I and the cardiologist had subbed in that night. Had this occurred anywhere but a hospital, I would have been a goner. The cardiologist (read that HERO) called ahead to have the cath lab ready as I was expressed through ER. He determined that I had complete blockage in the trunk of the left main coronary artery and some lesser blockage in branches and also in branches on the right side. I now have all new plumbing and am still on the preferrred side of the surface of the earth. God and fate determined that I would have this event under circumstances where I could be saved. I came home last Monday evening and have been out and about though I am patiently waiting to get my energy level back (severe anemia after the surgery, though the red count is on the rise). Many changes all of a sudden.