shimmer in eye during hard workouts/races

Are you near sighted? If so, you are at higher risk.

If it were me, I'd get it checked out by an ophthalmologist. It could possibly signal a retinal problem - perhaps an impending detachment. Just an educated guess but you might look into it.

Your description sounds like an aura which I get when I have a migraine.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aura_%28symptom%29

When I first got an aura I didn't have any headache pain with it.

google "optical migraine"

cold warrior wrote:

It could possibly signal a retinal problem - perhaps an impending detachment. Just an educated guess but you might look into it.

This was my first thought upon reading the thread title. Get it checked out. Don't gamble with your sight.

oh cmon take a chance, its just an eye!

Go to your doctor. Get all the electrodes put on you. Get on the treadmill and run till it happens. See if the EKG shows any anomalies. Be safe. I would not ignore this.

You say you've got more than 30 years of running experience, so you probably old to start seeing signs of cardiovascular problems. Running is not a cure or 100% prevention of such things.

Good luck!

I just asked an optometrist friend about your symptoms and he said it sounded like a vitreous detachment - usually a benign condition. But from the symptoms, a retinal tear or detachment can't be ruled out. Early treatment of retinal problems is easy and effective, but late treatment has poor outcome. Get it checked out.

This does not sound like optical migraine to me. Onset at your age, male sex, always one eye and in the same place in your visual field, and only with hard running as the trigger would be very very unusual for migraine. Even the online references posted by another reader suggested eye exam before settling on optical migraine as a diagnosis.

An eye exam is an easy thing. Be smart. Don't risk it. If everything looks great, no problem. But you might save yourself a lot of trouble by having it looked into.

I've been getting this for a few years now. It only happens after harder efforts, but not after every hard effort. I get it in the exact same spot.

Thanks for the feedback! Very helpful.

Dehydration

I think I had the exact anomaly you are describing. I had it last year and it has since disappeared. It presented as a "flashing" or "shimmering" in one eye (left) upon waking up in the morning. It also happened when I ran; it would appear after about 20 minutes of running. I didn't notice it too much during the day though I could sense blurriness in my field of vision. It would dissipate about 10-20 minutes after the run. No pain. I scheduled an appointment with an opthamologist ASAP! He peeked inside my eye and sent me to a retinal specialist who diagnosed me with CRVO - central retinal vein occlusion. This is basically a blood clot in the retinal vein. I am young and relatively fit but I had a battery of blood tests looking for cholesterol levels and genetic susceptibility to clotting and so on. My cholesterol levels were low as they should be for a 26 yo runner. My only risk factor was having elevated blood pressue. They diagnosed it as "papillophlebitis" which is ideopathic CRVO. I understand ideopathic is "doctor-ese" for "we dont know why". I did not experience any temporary or permanent loss of vision. I now take BP meds and one full strength aspirin a day at the advice of my doc. The condition has since disappeared. I know of no one who has ever experienced the same thing.

I am relieved to hear that I am not the only runner with a CRVO. I am waiting on heart scans but hoping I am also idiopathic. I've run 2 ultras this year before I lost the vision in my left eye. Don't smoke, hardly drink, not on birth control, no genetic history, blood tests normal, no high blood pressure, brain MRI normal, aorta ultrasound normal. My vision is still blurry on the left, but is apparently healing. Taking a baby aspirin every day. I'm only 36. This seems like a rare thing but I am still pretty worried about it.