50+ Masters Training and Racing Open Forum

amk, my wife has been having similar foot/calf cramp issues in her swim workouts and waking her up at night for the last year or so. She went through the process of trying to improve Mg and Potassium intake to see if it would help without seeing any real improvement. She has been very careful about low salt intake for blood pressure reasons for a long time. We recently ended up eating out/getting takeout a couple of times that turned out to be very high salt content items. Her cramping problem in workout suddenly stopped for several days right after that. It looks like she may have gotten to the point of being slightly sodium deficient with her low salt diet. She now is experimenting with finding a level of salt intake that is just enough to stop the cramping.

dhaaga congrats on the AG win and time! And thanks. I signed up for Boston and hoping for better weather than 2018.

good running and congrats sc cush for keeping that sub 5 streak alive and well

rdb, hear you on the social media, it's a slippery slope and I usually find I'm at the bottom of the heap no matter how you cut it! Nice 5K, you're running really well!

Nothing much spectacular to report here, getting in some decent weeks, alternating 65-55 mpw over the past month. Had 7X 3min session on Wednesday this week and turned it around with 5X 5 minutes at threshold, 1 min recovery at 8600' on Friday. That one went pretty well.

This fall my race schedule has included 5K XC, HM, 5K XC, and 5K road. One more race to go for 2021.

A pretty typical week for me. The left hammy tightened up a bit on thursday. Seems ok now.

Mon. 37 min kayak.

10 km hilly trail run in 60 mins.

Tue. 20 km mtn bike in 58 mins.

5 km run in 27 mins with 3 x 800 pickups.

Wed. 41 min kayak.

10 km hilly run in 60 mins.

Thu. 22 km mtn bike in 59 mins.

5 km run eased off to slow jog with tight left hammy.

Fri. 36 min kayak.

Skipped the planned run.

Sat. 31 kms mtn bike riding loose gravel roads near the army base. 89 mins in strong winds.

Sun. I was just gonna do a hilly 10 km hike but the hammy felt fine so ended up running 15 kms with 370 metres elevation gain in a leisurely 103 mins.

@ Charlie

Your training is unique and produces great performances. Thinking about a big dose of treadmill runs this week at steep inclines to avoid injury from the high volume. Just looked at my last chip timed time for the race in two weeks a couple years back which I was 8 th overall. Think I'm as fit but not when it comes to running. A couple Africans that had bad days and a professional ultra runner won it. It was hotter than usual so maybe I get lucky this year and get a sub 70 day. Like to win enough to pay for my cheap flight and hotel.

2740 Runners - Chip Results

1 Harry Jones Male 18-39 yrs Male 18-39 yrs 2:34:32

2 181349 Koji Sakimoto Male 18-39 yrs 2:39:13

3 182798 Julius Kiptum Mutai Male 18-39 yrs 2:41:05

4 N0023 Wongboworn Phatsadee Male 18-39 yrs 2:41:14

5 180906 Jaco Smith Male 18-39 yrs 2:45:21

6 502063 Robert Krogh Male 50&Over 2:46:20

7 N0168 Jamrat Laonan Male 18-39 yrs 2:49:53

8 181133 Uthai Jaitep Male 18-39 yrs 2:52:06

9 401548 Adul Thongsamool Male 40-49 yrs 2:54:29

10 401655 Jian Chen Male 40-49 yrs 2:54:21

Hey thanks for your response. I haven't really thought of that. I would say that my form is pretty good. But certainly something to think about.

old guy II wrote:

amk, my wife has been having similar foot/calf cramp issues in her swim workouts and waking her up at night for the last year or so. She went through the process of trying to improve Mg and Potassium intake to see if it would help without seeing any real improvement. She has been very careful about low salt intake for blood pressure reasons for a long time. We recently ended up eating out/getting takeout a couple of times that turned out to be very high salt content items. Her cramping problem in workout suddenly stopped for several days right after that. It looks like she may have gotten to the point of being slightly sodium deficient with her low salt diet. She now is experimenting with finding a level of salt intake that is just enough to stop the cramping.

Interesting thought. My blood pressure was nice and low until my mid-50s, then started creeping up. No health care provider has ever suggested it's a problem but I'm a little nervous about it. For the past 6-8 years I've been trying to limit my sodium intake, but I'm not rigorous about it and I really doubt low sodium is the cause of my troubles. Still, I should start keeping track of whether the calf cramps correlate with times when I'm being particularly "good" about sodium intake.

Amkelley

I've mentioned it before in a post years ago replying I think to a post you made. I also was a low sodium advocate until I experimented with increasing my sodium because of terrible cramping back in 2016.

The results were amazing! The cramps disappeared and I was bloated for a week or so. My body adjusted and I actually started looking less bloated than before taking on more sodium. Cheap here to go to a clinic and have tests run so I did this regularly. Blood pressure dropped to the point they would always question the reading and my HR was around 32-38 at the clinic (not this low anymore but different cyclist training back then). Sodium levels were fine also. I put about 1-2 teaspoon per quart of all the water I drink. Adjusting the amount in relationship to how much I sweat.

Blood pressure devices are cheap and easy to use. Maybe buy one like I did and check throughout the day. 5 years later my blood pressure is higher but still in the low range and my heart rate is around 5 beats higher. The heart rate increase has nothing to do with sodium IMO.

Big Mango, I did buy a BP monitor about a year ago but it doesn't work on me. It gives readings that are very inconsistent (successive readings 30 seconds apart vary massively) and usually ridiculously low compared with what I get at a doctor's or dentist's office. The device works fine on my husband, so I have to conclude the problem is the small size of my arm. Since I actually did check that before I bought it and my arm was supposedly within (although way on the lower end of) the acceptable size range, I'm not eager to waste my money on another one.

AMK, have you ever used Stim-O-Stam? An old skool product that I still use for buffering lactates...and when my bride has her intense foot cramping, I have her take it for a day or so with great success.

DHaaga...what a stud marathon...dang... and congrats.

I had a decent week...for a dinosaur that is.

Yesterday made precisely 49 years since my first ever marathon (Philadelphia, November 27, 1972) and I aspire to knock out ONE more 26.2 miler in 2022 in order to commemorate the 50th anniversary of that inaugural effort. We'll see. Four new screws in my right foot may have something to say about that.

Speaking of which, I ran my first rust buster since surgeries on Thursday at the local yokel 5K turkey trot. Finished first in the 65-66 age group ;} with a blazing 24:42.

I had BIG hopes of cracking 8:00 pace, and did so...barely. It's kind of an embarassing metric to post, as it's more than 10 freaking minutes slower than my PR, but, the stopwatch does not lie. Oh, and it damn near killed me to hit that mark...was no 'jog-a-thon' performance, instead balls to the wall...I honestly do not think that I could have run one second faster....eeeeessshh.

Wishing everyone a swell week ahead. We're headed to NYC on Tuesday where I always dig running on the bridle path in Central Park. One such run will be with 2 of my 1974 college cross country teammates...that'd probably make for a somewhat amusing YouTube video...kinda' like watching catastrophic car crashes just for sh&%s and grins.

your pal,

MF

BigMango Think I'm as fit but not when it comes to running.

First of all zero exp on the marathon but I did read Boston Marathon: The History of the World's Premier Running Event by Tom Derderian Fantastic book!

Suggest something obvious which you probably already did :

-Do what worked last time

-Go out like as the song says nothing else matters

MikeF. wrote:

Speaking of which, I ran my first rust buster since surgeries on Thursday at the local yokel 5K turkey trot. Finished first in the 65-66 age group ;} with a blazing 24:42.

I had BIG hopes of cracking 8:00 pace, and did so...barely. It's kind of an embarassing metric to post, as it's more than 10 freaking minutes slower than my PR, but, the stopwatch does not lie. Oh, and it damn near killed me to hit that mark...was no 'jog-a-thon' performance, instead balls to the wall...I honestly do not think that I could have run one second faster....eeeeessshh.

your pal,

MF

And yet no one of your vintage ran faster. We might be slowing down but we are still competetive in the war of attrition.

amkelley wrote:

Big Mango, I did buy a BP monitor about a year ago but it doesn't work on me. It gives readings that are very inconsistent (successive readings 30 seconds apart vary massively) and usually ridiculously low compared with what I get at a doctor's or dentist's office. The device works fine on my husband, so I have to conclude the problem is the small size of my arm. Since I actually did check that before I bought it and my arm was supposedly within (although way on the lower end of) the acceptable size range, I'm not eager to waste my money on another one.

The old fashioned manual sphygmo tends to be more accurate. First thing the MET team do when they turn up for a ?BP call is to do a manual.

If you can find a child's cuff to use on the machine you will probably get a more reliable reading.

MikeF, Great race and congrats on breaking 8 min pace. Never raced a 5k but sounds painful! Are the screws in the foot because of a running injury?

Hey great run KPdx

And congratulations winning your age group. Good luck in the nationals?

Regarding my achilles. I haven't had achilles problems for a couple of years, although my right one does get a bit tight every now and then.

Obviously wearing spikes might place them under stress, but fortunately that hasn't been the case. I also like to do drills and strides and cool down on the infield barefoot

As for the weights, I do place a lot of emphasis on form and I don't get any reaction. I tend to do no more than 3 or 4 exercises: 2 warm up sets with increasing weight and one set to failure working within the range of 6-12 reps. So quality rather than volume

Exercises include which I vary throughout he week: dead lifts, squats, leg press , good mornings. Pull downs, bench press, lat flys , chin-ups, press-ups and of course ab and back work.

But certainly thank you for your feed back, always open to any advice if I think it is worth considering

Talking of weights how many other. guys do weights ?

I am two years away from turning 50, have been training my ass off for Club XC, and am looking forward to flipping to a new age group.

I gotta say, this thread inspires the s$&@ out of me. You guys are awesome.

Good morning,

It is snowing heavily. After 20 days running everyday, today will be off. Already needed to reduce the load on Saturday and Sunday for keeping the balance with family stuff etc. Time for some fresher legs. It is more fun to run on fresh, springy and speedy legs in bad weather compared with crawling along on tired leags.

The week:

Mo 7 miles easy

Tu 30 min jumps and drills uphill, 6x60m uphill, 2x150m uphill

We 7 miles easy, 6x30s/30s

Th 7.5 miles lower end of Zone 2

Fr 7 miles easy, 5x100m buildups with jog back

Sa WU, 10x60m buildups uphill with walk back (instead of 300m uphill and jog down), CD

Su 50 min (instead of 80-90 min) recovery pace

Take care, stay/get healthy

PS. I do not save on salt in our self cooked meals (but we are avoiding pre-processed stuff).

Missing lucKY2b. Hope you are doing fine?