HELP!!! Suddenly lost the ability to do any type of fast running

Do you do strides after easy runs? If no, perhaps you should. But before that, try rolling out your hamstring (with a hard elevated roller or a softball) and your quads. I would suggest not stretching it. How does it feel after a hot bath/shower?

Have you run faster than 63 before?

It could be a lot of things. Fatigue. Overtraining. Mono. You're coming down with a cold. Iron levels. Weird diet. Skipping lunch or breakfast. Lots of stress in other parts of your life.

Talk to your parents, coach, and doctor and see what they say.

Yes I do strides after easy runs. I've started doing mobility exercises rather than stretches but it hasn't seemed to help.

Yes I've run faster than 63- last year I ran 58 in the time trial at the first day of practice but that was coming off ZERO speedwork over winter. That's what has me worried since I did some speed over winter this year but am much slower.

Try taking an icebath, that always seems to do the trick for me. See if you can go to a massage therapist

Maybe you were over-stretching your hamstrings. It's easy to do. I over-stretched my hamstrings for years.

Foam roll your entire leg and spend time working out all the tender spots. See if you can find a Graston specialist in your area. Graston has helped me a ton. Be careful with stretching... Also try to relax. Your body will hold on to tension if you stay stressed out. And lastly be patient.

Also make sure you're properly fueling. Training depleted will make your workouts suck.

He trained too hard. Stop with all the patch up advice. OP needs to go back to base building.

Maybe not, hit the trails and jog your mileage for 3-7 days then see how you feel.

there's one useful response here by @starthere. Don't get hung up on just your hamstrings, sounds like a symptom of something else to me. Go get a blood test, look for (at least) the following:

CK: likely too high if acutely overtrained (don't go the day after lifting, useless).

WBC/Leukocytes: likely high if you are carrying some virus/fighting some infection.

Iron: careful, the values you want are: Ferritine (normal doctors may say > 20 is okay, for a distance runner, should be no lower than 30 (this is females, I've heard males want to be even higher)). Hemoglobin and hematocrite are often reported with iron levels to give a better picture of what's happening with red blood cells.

Make sure you get the read-out of our blood work and then show it to someone who knows about athletics, not all doctors/labworkers get the difference in my experience.

Disclosure: I'm not a doctor, I ran for my national team for 10+ years and those are always the first things they check for in an athlete (living in a place with good public health insurance). When I was iron-deficient, i felt fine on normal runs, but couldn't go fast. This happens to women all the time (periods etc.), less in males but still an easy thing to check and important.

Don't listen to the ice bath/stretch hacks, you don't go from 58 to 63 over 400 by missing an icebath or massage. Sure, those help with recovery, but it's a joke for what you're describing. Good luck.

Get your iron levels checked. Make sure that your doctor checks your Ferritin. If it is below 40, you need to start supplementing.

So this happened to me and I never really got a clear answer as to why but I can day that bloodwork is the best first step. For context this happened to me twice. The first time was because I had mono. It sucks and it took a full year to feel like I could run fast again. The next time I was a 4:08 full mile indoors and ran a season best 29 minute 8k the next year. If you haven't run 8ks before that is BAD given my other times. Like, ridiculously bad. It took some serious rest and patience to let my body heal. I figure now that it was the combination of ignoring some injuries and overtraining to compensate but either way I guarantee you can bounce back. Take it easy for a week, maybe just easy runs and a day or two off and get tested for mono and other blood levels. Your season isn't over, you're probably just a little overtrained and need some rest but definitely check the boxes to be sure it's not more serious.

Did you get an electrical shock? Same symptoms for this woman.

https://www.outsideonline.com/2408244/rebecca-mehra-runner-electric-shock-mystery

I actually had mono a year and a half ago and had to sit out the second half of the cross country season that year. I had my iron checked then and it was fine. I don't have any signs of being sick/deficient right now (fatigue) and I feel good on easy runs. But whenever I try doing speedwork it feels impossible and my lower back/butt/hamstring feel like cement after finishing the first rep. The faster I'm going the worse it seems.

It's not Just Iron to check. You need to have a complete Bloodwork done:

1.) KIDneys

2.) CEP Protein

3.) Folate&the entire B complex

4.) Magnesium

5.) Thyroid

6.) Parathyroid

7.) Vitamin D 25hydroxy

8.) B12

9.) Copper

10.) Zinc

**If you question that you don't need this then you have to ask has this been going on for 6 weeks? Having an insufficient Biomarker will last more than that...For example my symptoms were more than 6 weeks and I was not just iron issue. Mostly it was B12, Folate, Copper, and Magnesium. All of these are vital minerals/vitamins for making you have your 58second talent.

Magnesium and Vitamin D are vital to mineralizing the tissues while B complex are necessary for the nerve impulses to make muscles/tendons firing.

All of this may seem complex and question if it's worth it. For me with insurance for the Bloodwork(complete as noted above) it was $400- I did know a sports nutritionist who counseled on the best levels and why. This was worth it for general health but of course for endurance athlete.

Based on the thread title alone I was almost certain this was posted by Galen Rupp.

Hamstrings (posterior chain) are probably weak and tight. Probably landing too far out from your center of gravity. Try strengthening hamstrings/ glutes, stretching quads/hips flexors.

old guy 74 wrote:

Maybe you were over-stretching your hamstrings. It's easy to do. I over-stretched my hamstrings for years.

+1

try one legged glute bridges, the couch stretch, the 3rd world squat, and lots of hip flexor stretches like pigeon pose and figure 4.

leave the hams themselves alone for a while.