Chronic Dehydration?

magnesium chloride

Supporting those who think I pay too much attention to these things, Scorpion Runner, here are my weight fluctuations over the last 5 years (the individual data points are 7 day trailing averages, not my weight on individual days)

https://imgur.com/a/lqUF0

Do you take any supplements? You're diet is probably insufficient in a lot of key minerals and vitamins. Not enough fresh veggies.. and possibly not enough whole grains. I would also take a look at your shoes if you haven't.. you might be a guy that needs more cushion.

There are few people that I say this to or recommend but you might be a candidate for gel use during competition.

I do take a multivitamin daily. I also tend to have fresh vegetable and whole grains with dinner, but less so with breakfast and lunch.

I'm going to give the magnesium chloride a whirl.

Smoove wrote:

Supporting those who think I pay too much attention to these things, Scorpion Runner, here are my weight fluctuations over the last 5 years (the individual data points are 7 day trailing averages, not my weight on individual days)

https://imgur.com/a/lqUF0

You are such a data nerd! You should be a triathlete.

Well, I am trying to shave a few grams off of my racing kit . . .

Smoove, its weird this came up today because I've been having the SAME issue. Calf cramping at night waking me up, Quad cramps again in my sleep. I think it might be because I stop drinking water past 7:00 so I don't wake up to pee. Maybe you do the same?

RejectJogger wrote:

Smoove, its weird this came up today because I've been having the SAME issue. Calf cramping at night waking me up, Quad cramps again in my sleep. I think it might be because I stop drinking water past 7:00 so I don't wake up to pee. Maybe you do the same?

You should probably drink some water, or better yet, gatorade closer to bed time young one

I typically have a glass of water or two right before bed. It's a chronic thing, not just in isolated patches.

ThatAverageRunner wrote:

RejectJogger wrote:

Smoove, its weird this came up today because I've been having the SAME issue. Calf cramping at night waking me up, Quad cramps again in my sleep. I think it might be because I stop drinking water past 7:00 so I don't wake up to pee. Maybe you do the same?

You should probably drink some water, or better yet, gatorade closer to bed time young one

I probably do need more salt in my diet, this has been happening more since its getting warmer and I'm drinking and eating like its winter. I'll fix that up.

Smoove wrote:

I could do better there - for long runs or any weekend run, maybe a 12 ounce glass of water. Weekdays are evening run days, so I'm loaded up pretty well for those.

In the summer, I usually drink a quart of water before heading out for long runs. You might try putting down liquid before you run until you're sloshing, and see whether that makes a difference. For you, it might need to be gatorade or some other brand of monkeypiss. You might also make sure that you're not going to bed dehydrated. I think a lot of runners overlook that.

That said, I have never been prone to cramping, even when I screw up and run low on water. I just grind to a halt. It is possible that your cramping issues are unrelated to hydration.

I don't know if this has been mentioned yet but you may want to consider that the cramping is simply due to overload and muscular fatigue especially if this only happens at the longer distances. I know your training is solid but is there any other way you can prepare your body for the rigors of hard, long runs? Do you practice supplemental strength training?

I gave some thought to the muscle fatigue issue, especially when it happened during my 2017 Boston training cycle since I had to ramp that one up a bit more quickly than I would have liked since I was coming back from an injury and was starting from scratch in early October. The main reason I am not leaning more in that direction is because of the upper body cramping and because it happened relatively early in both of my Boston training cycles. My forearms are probably not cramping up from muscle fatigue - and that body wide aspect of it is what makes me think it is more likely an electrolyte issue.

I still cannot rule muscle fatigue out, so I have been doing some calf raises to try to bolster my strength there, but I should probably do more.

Some people swear by pickle juice.

Okay, lots of advice here, and I appreciate the input. I think some of bits will work be more applicable to me than others, but hopefully others can also get good info from this thread even if it doesn't apply to me.

I think my takeaways will be:

- More water in the morning before running.

- More fluids in the middle of my runs.

- A higher percentage of carbs in my diet.

- Cut back on my alcohol consumption.

- Cut back on the 5 Hour Energy consumption.

- Add in some magnesium chloride.

- Add in even more green leafy vegetables (I do actually consume a fair amount of these already).

- Keep going with the Pedialyte.

- Keep going with the salt tablets.

- Keep going with the calf raises.

In some other thread, you said you drink a liter before going out for runs. I'd think that would upset the electrolyte balance in the body, at least it would for me. I did that once and cramped extra early. Maybe just accept the weight loss during runs, and drink to thirst only. Some research has shown that the top runners lose the most water weight in some races.

Also cut back on your marathon running.

A few other things.

1) Put on calf sleeves after your run, 30-45mins while you stretch/nibble and calm down. This will make a world of difference in the initial post hard running twitchiness that tired calves engage in.

2) Try a couple of 3hr proper long slow runs. Is it really the effort that gets you or are you not sufficiently helping your body understand that it'll be doing long runs.

3) Experiment with a gel. Every 5 miles like it says in whatever runner world is these days. Seriously, one every hour of your marathon specific long runs will help. I will tuck into one prior to a hard TLT session too.

Losing 5lbs is nothing for me as a 138 ish guy, I'll get down to ~130 on my key long runs. I've only really had calf cramping issues, with minimal quad/hammy too, but they're much easier to catch before it hurts.