BRENTWOOD — A Pittsburg High senior training for a future with the U.S. Marines died during an exercise run Tuesday night, police said.

Floyd Burrell, 17, collapsed around 5:48 p.m. at Veteran’s Park, located at 3841 Balfour Road, while on a “pre-training” exercise before his stint in the U.S. Marines began after his June graduation, Brentwood police spokesman Lt. Walter O’Grodnick said. Other recruits also were running, O’Grodnick said.

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Letters: Power and housing | Vote on zoning | Fallen heroes | Lacking leadership “From what we can tell, it was simply a pre-training exercise run,” O’Grodnick said. “The park is about seven blocks from the recruiting office, but we don’t know if they had just started or were looping back. Those are all questions we’ll get answered.”

Officers found Burrell unresponsive with CPR being performed, and he died at a hospital after being taken in an ambulance. Police did not say whether he ever regained consciousness.

Police said Burrell suffered an unexpected medical complication before collapsing. The Contra Costa County Coroner’s Office will perform an autopsy.

“It’s safe to say, something triggered it,” O’Grodnick said. “We’ll look at everything prior to the run and during the run. We’re interested in what the autopsy shows.”

Calls to the recruiting office on Wednesday morning went unanswered.

Burrell played football through his junior season at Pittsburg and was a popular figure on the campus, Principal Todd Whitmire said. He had nine tackles while playing defensive end and caught one pass for 9 yards as a fullback during his junior year, but sat out his senior campaign with an injury.

The school used their library and cafeteria Wednesday to set up counseling stations for grieving students. The counselors will remain at least until the end of the week, Whitmire said.

“He was a really nice young man who was really excited about joining the Marines,” Whitmire said. “He was very laid back, popular among the other students and very polite. He’d been conditioning to get ready, and really couldn’t contain how he couldn’t wait to graduate and get started.”

Whitmire informed his staff of the news privately on Wednesday and said that news of Burrell’s death spread quickly on social media and preceded many students to school.

“It’s hitting the students very hard,” he said.

The school will honor Burrell on Thursday night during an honors night for all of the school’s students will be joining the military after graduation.

Contact Rick Hurd at 925-945-4789.