The last couple of longer rides I’ve done where I’ve pushed the pace, I’ve experienced cramping/soreness in my inner thighs. After last weekend’s race, the fellow doing ART in the free massage tent told me I was tight in the inside hamstring. Any idea what would cause this? I find it odd – shouldn’t I feel it in the back or front of the leg rather than on the inside? I wonder if it’s a cleat angle thing, or a fit issue of some sort. In sort of typical female fashion, my legs aren’t particularly straight from hip to knee to foot… I wonder if that has something to do with it. Anyone else experience this?
You might want to go to your LBS and get a re fit.
Had similar issues.
Worked wonders.
Last year I was having bad cramping issues in those muscles on rides that should not have caused cramping. I had changed my cycling shoes to shoe with slightly different sole thickness, wich changed my effective seat height. All I had to do was adjust my saddle a few millimeters and the cramping went away.
Did you raise the seat? I can get rid of the cramping by standing straight up on the pedals and stretching… I wonder if I raised the seat a smidge if that would help. Though when I had my initial bike fit, the fitter ‘negotiated’ a slightly lower seat with me to keep my hips from rocking (I was riding pretty high before… and I tend to point my toes at the bottom of the pedal stroke).
I lowered it. Relieving the cramping and preventing the cramping are two different things, so if you’re sitting so high that your hips are rocking and toes are pointing, you may want to try lowering the seat to see if it helps. If not, go back to what you’re comfortable with.
The last couple of longer rides I’ve done where I’ve pushed the pace, I’ve experienced cramping/soreness in my inner thighs.
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Hello surroundhound and All,
On long rides I would get cramps in my inner thigh (adductors) if I neglected putting in a bit of time on the adductor/abductor weight machine.
I would guess that more time on long rides would get the same result but the regular sessions on the adductor/abductor weight machine were the cure for me … so now I incorporate that weight routine in my lower body workout sequence.
Seems like that machine is a favorite place for people to sit and look at their smart phone so I do that exercise out of sequence anytime the machine is vacant.
Cheers,
Neal
+1 mph Faster
Hello surroundhound and All,
On long rides I would get cramps in my inner thigh (adductors) if I neglected putting in a bit of time on the adductor/abductor weight machine.
I would guess that more time on long rides would get the same result but the regular sessions on the adductor/abductor weight machine were the cure for me … so now I incorporate that weight routine in my lower body workout sequence.
Seems like that machine is a favorite place for people to sit and look at their smart phone so I do that exercise out of sequence anytime the machine is vacant.
Cheers,
Neal
+1 mph Faster
This is a fantastic post. Due in no small part to that fascinating computer generated image.
The last couple of longer rides I’ve done where I’ve pushed the pace, I’ve experienced cramping/soreness in my inner thighs.
That would have been my first guess as well. Most of the time when I cramp it is due to riding above my fitness level for too long and/or a combination of riding with intensity and residual fatigue. I had the exact same inner thigh cramp a couple weeks ago that was really tender for 3 days following. I knew at the time I was going a bit too intense in relation to the residual fatigue from consecutive days of intervals. Of course it could be something different for the OP as other have suggested, but your highlight is what I first thought.
Some might not agree, but the following links have helped me in the past for at minimum something to read a different view. They have a menu list to the right side for each of these and a few more that I did not include.
http://www.sportsscientists.com/2007/11/muscle-cramps-part-i/
http://www.sportsscientists.com/2007/11/muscle-cramps-part-ii/
http://www.sportsscientists.com/2007/11/muscle-cramps-part-iii/
http://www.sportsscientists.com/2007/11/muscle-cramps-part-iv/
IMO, that points to a fit issue - if it is in fact your abductors cramping.
“ideally” everything is lined up such that your larger muscles are doing what they do best (moving the bike forward) and these smaller muscles are barely engaged - just keeping things inline. For whatever reason, your “inner thighs” are having to work OT to keep things straight.
Interesting… you might have something there. I did a 70km charity ride a couple weeks ago with no issues, did a faster 35.5km over the weekend in a tri race (had some cramping), and pushed the 50km on Tuesday which also led to cramping/soreness. I definitely had some residual fatigue from the race, and from a run the night before. I’ll try another long ride at a slightly lower effort, with fresher legs, and see if that solves the issue. I know I need to improve my bike fitness, but this might be a “slow down” indicator for me to listen to – at least when I’m training. In a race, my response is generally “shut up, legs”. 
It is one of the greatest challenges to balance that ever so fine line between training hard enough (progressive training) and overreaching. I come from a background as a long time competitive lifter and when I retired I was then able to start improving my cardio fitness, which led me to cycling. Even though I was a high level competitor, had a good knowledge of strength training, nutrition and even coaching others I did not have practical experience with managing the load with mixed training activities. When I saw discussions from cycling coaches that training with a power meter had so much value in managing training stress loads I considered that it may be a valuable guidance tool. There are many that consider these metrics to be a lot of hocus pocus, but in my case it really helped me (self-coached in cycling) start formulating a weekly training structure that got me a little closer to that fine line between being progressive and overreaching.
We are each different (genetics, training structure, etc.) so the following is simply how I came to the conclusion of my issue.
What I did not previously understand years ago before using a power meter was my weekly training load and then go out to do a group ride with people that were more advanced in endurance fitness. I tried my best to hang with them and as a result I would cramp up because I was not considering the previous days of training and then attempting to hang with people above my level. Now this may not be bad as we hear some advise that it is beneficial to train with faster folk, but when you are fatigued already from previous days of training and then mound on top of that a very aggressive long ride with many match burning moments and the opportunity of a cramp increased. When I did cramp most would throw out the usual suspects of hydration, electrolytes and bike fit. But I started to deduct from those feeling fairly confident that I had good hydration drinking pre-ride and during, my bottles had electrolytes added and this was the bike(s) were all professionally fitted by one of the best fitters in Atlanta that I have many thousands of miles without cramping.
That led me to look at my training load, training structure and the unpredictable highly aggressive nature of these group rides.
Last night I received an email from this same group and today I am once again at a crossroads for a decision. I feel it is an absolute privilege to get a personal invite to ride with this group and the email last night stated the course they are doing is 80 miles with one long climb of 9 miles avg. 7% gradient, lot of sharp rollers and they will probably be riding at a solid pace. My issue is that I have turned down their invite for the past three rides and I know it will not be long before they simply stop inviting me. However, if tonight goes well I will have three days of top of L4 intervals and my legs are feeling it. I think if I go to this ride it will have a high risk of overreaching. Even if I were to ride it easy at my own pace it racks up to at least 300 TSS. The last time I did this route with them over a month ago I had near 400 TSS and that is simply too much on a fatigued body not to mention how it will disrupt the following training structure.
It is easier in my case compared to triathletes because I can manage my training load because I only do cycling (I don’t count lifting). I have somewhat of an understanding of my weekday TSS from doing indoor intervals at a higher intensity and then what I can do for an long endurance rides on the weekends when it comes to managing that load. For instance I cannot do the group’s 80 mile ride with 7,000 ft of elevation gain at an aggressive pace with 350+ TSS, but I can go out on my TT bike and do 80 miles on a flat course and if I keep that at L2 Endurance I can keep the TSS from going above 260 TSS. I have found that about 250 +/- TSS for my 80 mile route lets me train endurance and yet does not disrupt my following training days. So more than likely I will reluctantly decline the invitation from the group for my solo option so that I can control my intensity in order to manage my training load.
But there are a lot of other factors and some days I do miscalculate nutrition / hydration and perhaps some days it could be an electrolyte imbalance. Most of time when I have cramped and I looked back I typically can see that I pushed just a hair over that line of overreaching and that is not always a bad thing because it kind of gives me a clue that I am least trying to push myself to improve.
Best wishes
I’ve had similar issues but the cramp was primarily in the VMO. Always when I’ve pushed too hard at the end of a long ride. I don’t have any good advice except keep working to improve when the cramping occurs 
What an excellent article, thanks for posting.
I’d happily volunteer for these types of studies as I am prone to cramping, the real, intense, debilitating, get off the bike writhing in agony, kind of cramping. Happened to me last week during the TrainerRoad 8DC challenge, due to, you guessed it, upping my training load too quickly!