Plymouth half marathon heart attack saved my life, says runner

Ms Privett told BBC Radio Devon: “Looking back, had it happened anywhere else I would not have got out, so to be honest, it was the best place for it to happen.”

She later found out she had a defect where her coronary artery was in the wrong place and became squashed during physical exertion, causing her cardiac arrest.

She said: “I was a ticking time bomb and I had a problem with my heart which I never knew.

“In a funny way, the Plymouth Half Marathon saved my life.”

Recalling the events that led up to her heart attack, she said she could remember “feeling good” and on track to match her targeted time.

But seemingly out of nowhere she “fell flat on [her] face”, breaking her front tooth and cutting open her knee.

Two fellow runners began giving Ms Privett CPR but could not bring her around.

St John’s Ambulance paramedics jumped in with their defibrillator, shocking her three times before she was conscious again.

“I do not remember anything – the last thing I remember is just coming up the hill,” she said.

“I just remember being in the ambulance and waking in the ambulance.”