Weird feeling in my legs ??

shedhead

Hi all,

Can anybody tell me if i'm weird or has this happened to anyone else before?

Up until about 4 mths ago i was commuting 200 miles a week on my fixie as well as rides at the weekend on my road bike. On my commute i would class it as part of my training & ride "properly" / not hanging about if you get my drift. I then started to notice a decrease in my aerobic capacity & my ability to "nail it" dropped dramatically. I also noticed a pain in my left leg when i exerted myself, trying to reach my limits of only a few weeks before. The pain felt like there was no oxygen getting to my leg & there was nothing there muscle-wise to call upon, i also started to feel a dull ache in my left arm, which is there most of the time, although does sometimes get fractionally worse on the bike. I also felt flu-like symptoms & was absolutely drained for about a month. I saw my GP who gave me every test he could think of, including an ECG, all of which were clear. I reduced my mileage considerably & drove to work a few days a week, after awhile i started to feel better & got back on the bike. Here's the rub, the feeling like i have nothing in my legs has come back along with the pain in my arm.

Apologies for the war & peace & thanks for reading & any help given.

Shedhead :shock:

ut_och_cykla

Get more tests - inc. Borrelia/ Lyme disease perhaps. Could be nerve thing from back too - if you do other exercise do you feel the same - or is it bike related? Would definitely go back to GP but quite what to do there I dont know - neurologist maybe?

Anonymous

Not enough rest I think. I did the same thing, having a 46 mile round trip commute, not hanging about on it either. Cut the commute time by half, got more sleep and it sorted itself out in a month.hope this helps.

Aapje

Sounds like classic overtraining/overreaching. I bet that you ride hard for every commute, requiring more than 18 hours to recover. So next day, you have a recovery debt, which you increase again by commuting again. A simple solution is to reduce the recovery time. You can do this by riding more slowly (during every commute, during one leg of the commute or on alternating days). Another solution is to allow more time for recovery, by driving to work every other day, for instance.

If you are riding on both Saturday and Sunday, I would strongly advise to stop riding on Sunday, to give your body more time to recover. It's better to ride twice the distance on Saturday and then take Sunday off, if you want to keep training just as much.

The pain in your arm may also be caused by overextending yourself.

shedhead

Hi fellas,

I've looked at the Lyme's thing & is interesting, i am going back to my GP anyway in a week as a follow-up. I did mention to him initially that i had inadvertently ridden through an area where there was contaminated water ( it was signposted & roped off, but the rope had fallen down & i rode through it, doh) but he dismissed this, although this did coincide with the start of my symptoms.

Dmclite, did you also have the pain in the arm & leg ?

Cheers

Anonymous

shedhead wrote:

Hi fellas,

I've looked at the Lyme's thing & is interesting, i am going back to my GP anyway in a week as a follow-up. I did mention to him initially that i had inadvertently ridden through an area where there was contaminated water ( it was signposted & roped off, but the rope had fallen down & i rode through it, doh) but he dismissed this, although this did coincide with the start of my symptoms.

Dmclite, did you also have the pain in the arm & leg ?

Cheers

Yeah, its difficult though, due to the fact that because I was doing too much, there were a lot of aches, pains and straining on and off the bike. The arm pains went sooner than the legs. Rest and recuperation helped loads. I also started whey protein after training which I cannot reccomend enough and got a really good memory foam mattress, which was not cheap but is worth its weight in gold. I use Syntrax 5.0 bananas and cream flavour whey with skimmed milk, btw.

shedhead

aapje,
yeah, i do ride hard 99% of the time, i try & take it easy, but i get bored & cane it. I've commuted all year round five days a week for about the last seven years on my fixie, i think this long winter has done me in, i may consider swapping the fixie for a cyclocross for next winter, the fixie is bloody hard work in the wind but i love riding it. i will certainly go with your suggestion & take it easy on some rides / days. Do you think the arm pain due to overstretching would manifest itself in just the one arm?

dmclite, i occasionally use whey protein after training but i think i'll have to get into the habit of using it regularly.

i want to sort this out for the summer now i've done my winter's penance !! & i'm hoping to do JoGLE next year

Cheers fellas

Aapje

shedhead wrote:

aapje,
yeah, i do ride hard 99% of the time, i try & take it easy, but i get bored & cane it.

I've got the same issue, which is why I do not ride daily. Fact is that the body needs to recover from hard efforts. It's possible to get away with your riding pattern if you are in tip-top shape, but it is fairly risky. You certainly cannot expect to jump right into it again after detraining (which you did to recover from overtraining). You also need to keep in mind that the older you get, the slower you recover.

I'm not saying that the other commenters aren't right as well, a virus might have pushed you over the edge.

I've commuted all year round five days a week for about the last seven years on my fixie, i think this long winter has done me in, i may consider swapping the fixie for a cyclocross for next winter, the fixie is bloody hard work in the wind but i love riding it.

I think that is a good idea. Gears are fun too (especially downhill or with the wind in your back).

i will certainly go with your suggestion & take it easy on some rides / days. Do you think the arm pain due to overstretching would manifest itself in just the one arm?

Sure, no one is truly symmetrical, so issues on just one side of the body are quite normal. Assuming you are right-handed, it's probably that you used your right side more during the time off the bike. Then when you got back on the bike, your left side was relatively weak and by overreaching, you might have hurt yourself.

PS. You could buy a heart rate counter. On the bike, you could try to make it a sport to keep your heart rate low on some days. That might be enough to keep you from flooring it.

shedhead

PS. You could buy a heart rate counter. On the bike, you could try to make it a sport to keep your heart rate low on some days. That might be enough to keep you from flooring it.

I have a Polar cs600 in the box, i've just got to find the time to fit it & work out how to use the bugger ! :shock: