I sometimes (but not often) get a very strong cramp in the arch of my foot. Enough to stop me swimming. It’s never bothered me during sprints or olympic distance, but seems to happen more regularly on longer distances. This seems to me to be the biggest objective threat to getting a DNF in my first HIM.
Any advice on avoidance tactics? I notice it often appears after pushing off from the wall during flip turns. I mildly optimistic that in a race in a lake, there won’t be any flip turns and hence no cramp, butr as some wise soul on here once said, hope is not an effective strategy.
Yup, that’s a common cramp, and yes it’s usually most apparent pushing off the wall so you’re correct that’s less of an issue in open water. However, the cold can sometimes be an aggravating factor, which of course would depend on your latitude and time of year. The other thing to consider, though, besides no pushing off the wall is that you should be kicking much less anyway than you would during a regular pool workout.
I usually get those sometimes when wearing fins. Take them off and I’m good. I’ve gotten hamstring cramps during long open water swims. No stopping in the deep water so I just keep going and eventually it works itself out.
I am very prone to cramps in my feet while swimming. I have no idea why. One time I got a cramp in each foot 100 meters into a race and had to pull the entire thing with my ankles held at a 90 degree angle.
I seem to be prone to swimming cramps in my feet and calves as well. I have found the supplement “sport legs” has really helped preventing them. They are designed to help one push harder on the bike. However, I find them to be priceless in the pool!
In my 25+ years of swimming I’ve had seasons where these cramps would happen. I was always scared to get them in the middle of a race.
I never found that supplements or bananas or any nutritional changes could prevent these cramps from happening. I tried just about everything–more salts, less salts, etc.
What did help me was stretching more (adding 1 or 2 sets of stretches for the muscle group that was giving me problems.) I also associated the cramps with the particular muscle group being out of shape. So I did some light weights training, usually different calf raises for all of these problems, and found that helped me out a lot. The calf raises stretch your muscles while working them out, assuming you are doing them correctly. You don’t need to go to the gym for this; you can do them on some stairs. Hold a backpack full of books on your shoulders for some extra weight if you need it.
Is this cramp due to pushing off the wall? If so, hydrate, eat your bananas frequently, stretch legs/calves well before swimming, and don’t push off the wall with maximum effort, and sometimes during the swim flex your toes up to your shin
Yeah, that is exactly when I got them, too: toward the end of a workout when I was pushing hard. Definitely monitor your hydration. You should burn through at least a liter of water in a 2 hour swimming workout (maybe more depending on how hard you push.) Remember that if you are feeling thirsty during your workout that you are already dehydrated. You need to be well hydrated about 6 hours ahead of your workout. If water isn’t doing it for you, the best route is squeezing a couple fresh oranges and maybe a teaspoon of salt into your liter of water. It’s sour tasting at first but it hydrates extremely well and imho better than sports drinks.
Not trying as hard will of course minimize your likelihood of getting the cramps but you’ll lose bigtime on your workout. I think you should just push hard until you get the cramps; and if they set in uncontrollably, stop working out, stretch nice and slowly and deliberately, and call it a day. Remember, today’s workout doesn’t make a bit of difference if you can’t do one tomorrow, too.
Back when I swam competitively I would occasionally get cramps in the arch of my foot, my calves, and sometimes in my hamstrings. In my experience, it was partly dehydration/nutrition, partly exhaustion from a long day of practice, and partly from pushing off the wall on flip turns.
Unfortunately (or fortunately, I guess), our coach was a hard-ass, and wouldn’t let us take a break for little things like cramps. So we would keep swimming. And you know what? They would eventually go away. It really wasn’t that bad.
I’ve even been fortunate enough (sarcasm) to get these cramps in my swimming races, and would just have to continue pushing as hard as possible until the race was over. (Partly because it was worse to disappoint the coach than to swim with a cramp.)
Best advice for prevention: Make sure you stay hydrated. I always drink from a water bottle between sets.
Best advice in the event of a cramp: Keep swimming (just slow down if you have to). In practice, if you keep swimming, you’ll be able to learn to deal with it in the case of a race. And I don’t think a foot cramp should really be bad enough to force you to stop swimming, but I don’t use my feet much when I swim anyway.
Best advice in the event of a cramp: Keep swimming (just slow down if you have to). In practice, if you keep swimming, you’ll be able to learn to deal with it in the case of a race. And I don’t think a foot cramp should really be bad enough to force you to stop swimming, but I don’t use my feet much when I swim anyway.
I don’t think he should unequivocally keep swimming after cramps. I agree that they sometimes (often) go away, but sometimes you can’t shake the damned things. He’s really got to listen to his body and make the call. Pushing through a workout is one thing but he doesn’t need to risk injury for the sake of one workout in the spirit of our hardassed jackass coaches. I cut my swimming teeth with one of those types. I never even saw someone skip a workout due to injury until I got to college.
Agreed, there could be some cases in which he may have to stop, rather than risk injury. I have just never experienced a leg cramp this bad while swimming, so I am unfamiliar with the idea. I am just giving advice the best I can, with the experience I have. No doubt, everything should be taken with a grain of salt.
Sorry for any confusion.
I get these too and are directly related to tight calf muscles from running. I now incorporate calf stretching into every swim warm-up. I do a warm-up such as 100 ez; stretch; 4 x 50, stretching after every 50; 100 ez; stretch.
swim through the arch cramps - they’ll go away fairly quickly. I think they’re pretty common, I used to get them all the time during competitive days, still do nowadays, but pretty rare.
x2 DON"T swim through the calf cramps - like someone else said that can cause injury that takes days or weeks to fully heal. My personal experience; got a calf cramp ~3/4 way through an oly tri, swam through it, then biked through it, then ran through it - actually never noticed it during the run. But it took ~3 weeks to feel normal again after that race, even with massage and a lot of stretching.