Two young adults collapsed and died shortly after crossing the finish lines of half marathons in Oregon this month — apparently from unexplained cardiac arrest.
Sunday morning, steps after completing the Eugene Half Marathon, 23-year-old Mateo Cruz collapsed on the track of Hayward Field on the University of Oregon campus. Race organizers said he received “immediate medical attention” from medics on an event team and from Eugene Springfield Fire.
Medics gave Cruz chest compressions, and he was taken to a nearby hospital but didn’t survive. Though his family couldn’t be reached for comment by The Oregonian/OregonLive, The Register-Guard in Eugene quoted his aunt as saying he had no known heart conditions. She said he also loved running and was looking forward to training for a marathon next.
Cruz lived in Eugene. Event results showed he finished the 13.1-mile race in just under two hours, clocking a pace of sub-nine-minute miles. He finished ahead of roughly two thirds of about 4,500 participants.
“Our deepest condolences go out to the family and friends of Mateo Cruz,” said Becky Radliff, events director. “This loss hurts us to the core. The entire running community who ran alongside Mateo yesterday mourns with his family.”
On April 5, another runner — Camryn Morris, a 19-year-old Oregon State University sophomore — died of cardiac arrest after completing the Corvallis Half Marathon. Moments after crossing the finish line, she “collapsed into the arms of her friends,” according to her obituary.
She was rushed to Good Samaritan Regional Medical Center in Corvallis and then Legacy Emanuel Medical Center in Portland, but doctors couldn’t save her, said her father, Jeff Morris. He said his daughter had no known history of heart problems and doctors haven’t been able to explain why her heart suddenly stopped.
“We asked ‘How could this happen? What happened?’” Jeff Morris said. “They couldn’t really give us any information.”
Camryn Morris grew up in the Tri-Cities area of Washington. She was captain of the Southridge High School varsity tennis team for two years and a valedictorian for the class of 2023. She was studying environmental engineering and adored the outdoors and hiking.
She’d also trained hard for the Corvallis Half Marathon with multiple runs of more than 10 miles, said her father. Her friends also reported that she seemed fine throughout the race.
“We were grateful that it didn’t happen on some training run where there was no one around,” Jeff Morris said, “because we felt like at least she got help right away.”
He said his family plans to travel to Corvallis soon to pick out a spot to place a memorial bench along a hiking trail in the McDonald and Dunn forests, a 15-minute drive from OSU’s campus and where his daughter had enjoyed hiking and doing coursework. A GoFundMe page has raised $6,300, which is more than double the amount needed for the bench.
A March study of the U.S. Race Associated Cardiac Event Registry shows that the risk of suffering cardiac arrest during or after a half marathon or marathon was less than one in 100,000, with 176 such incidents documented among more than 29 million runners from 2010 to 2023.
Most victims were men. About one-third of victims died. Researchers also have found that while the prevalence of cardiac arrests has stayed relatively steady since 2000, the dangers of dying have dropped. That’s likely, they believe, because of better planning for medical responses on race courses.
— Aimee Green is covering the Oregon Legislature this session. Reach her at 503-294-5119, agreen@oregonian.com or on Bluesky.
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