Billings runner prepares to reach milestone after major surgery

Billings, MT – For forty years, Cecil Pegram has been a globetrotter, literally traveling around the world with friends and family to compete in races.

But one day a Billings runner was stopped.

Pegram says: “I was running and training with friends and started having chest pains and shortness of breath. I wanted to believe it was just acid reflux. So I went and took the test and sure enough everything came out fine. it wasn’t acid reflux. The heart surgeon said, “Plan A is to do nothing and in six months to a year you will have a massive heart attack and die.” I asked, “What’s plan B?” So plan B was a quadruple bypass.

Pegram chose option B, and while the speedster’s recovery may have seemed slow, he had a group of friends running alongside him to keep up with him.

For example, Big Sky State Games Executive Director Liana Susott.

He says: “It took him a while to rebuild his body because he just started walking and then gradually switched to running and now he’s almost back to where he was when he started.”

Pegram says that months of support in many areas of his life helped him in his recovery and that “it was off-putting at first, but thanks to my daughters I was able to recover and get me to go for a walk and my running partners were there for me patient, they would run and come back and check on me.”

“And the rehabilitation team in St. Vs was very great, they pushed you a little bit but watched you closely, so I had a great network of friends.”

According to his post-operative doctor at St. Vincent, Dr. Chris Anzalone’s passion for physical fitness may have been the key to keeping Pegram in good health for so long.

The non-invasive cardiologist goes on to explain that “in his case, he noticed symptoms during exercise, which I think is important. If people lead very sedentary lifestyles, they may not even notice that they have problems. He noticed it very early and started treating it.” Our goal is always to get back to where he was and be able to do more.”

And now that Cecil feels fully recovered, he’s looking forward to his first post-surgery milestone of running his first competitive race this weekend.

Organized by his dear friend Liana, the Heart and Sole Run holds a special place for Cecil.

This is a run he has been running with his daughters for years every Father’s Day weekend.

And now he’s looking forward to crossing the finish line with them again.