Cramps

05-31-2004, 11:20 AM

I got into a pretty bad place with cramps yesterday doing a ride which
was a step up from what from what I had done before. It was a first try
at going up to Skyline from where I live in Palo Alto. Using a mapping
program,counting the ups and downs, this is about 2600 total feet of
gain. The first eight miles is rolling with total gain of 600 feet to
the start of Kings Mtn road, and then it gets hard and gains 1600 feet
in four miles. So I got to the top of that and took a rest. The day was
in the mid 70's and the route is mostly shady so I did't feel
particularly overheated, nor did it seem like I had sweated excessively.
I was tired but I didn't feel spent or bonked or particularyly
dehydrated. I spent about ten minutes resting and drank about 16 oz of
Gatorade and ate an enery bar. The I headed on. The rest of the route
was south on Skyline and was to gain about 300 feet over a couple of
miles and a few more downhill miles to my descent route. It was on this
uphill the trouble started. I started getting cramps in my quads and the
muscles on the inside of my thighs. I had to stop and get over them.
Then I started again and before long the cramps hit again. I took about
3 cycles of this to get over the hump and down La Honda road to the
flats. When I got there it was clear that I wasn't going to be able to
climb even the short hills it would take to get home, so to avoid a
littering citation, I called my spousal unit to come pick up the bike
and the grotesquely twitching corpse.

So what to do about this? How to avoid it. I want to do rides like this
and more. It wasn't like a bonk. If it weren't for the cramps, I had
plenty of energy to keep going. It seems like it was some sort of
depletion thing going on. I hit zero on something and the cramps
started. I stopped and recovered a little bit, but before long I zeroed
out again, and finally I got to where there was no recovery at all.

The one good thing I want to comment on, was the number people on bikes
who observed me having problems, and asked how I was doing or could they
help.

Mike

take 100 out of my email to reach me.