Numbness of arms and legs while swimming

Triathlon Forum
1

I have not seen a post about this, but perhaps some of you have experienced this before. I had a three workout day today, it was supposed to be two swims and short run. The swim in the morning went very well- 3200 total, main set was short and sweet, 12x100 holding 1:10/100 scy throughout leaving on the 1:20 interval. I did not feel whipped after this, and the run was also fine about 4 hours later (just a 30 minute run on a golf course near my house). I proceeded to the pool for my evening workout, which was to be an aerobic set, 10x400 yds to add some volume for the day. I was actually feeling quite good up through the first two reps, but on the third and fourth I was moving at the same pace but I felt a slight numbness set into my arms and legs.

It’s difficult to describe, but it felt like I couldn’t feel the water anymore with my hands and forearms, as if the nerves were dead, even though I was doing the same number of strokes and same speed. Coupled with that I had a sensation of anxiety come over me that was intense in spite of my attempts to breathe through it by focusing on relaxed exhaling under the water. I am not sure if this is really “bonking” because I feel that I did a good job of fueling throughout the day (I had eaten three meals and a snack up to that point with plenty of protein and carbohydrate). Needless to say I hit some kind of wall and my body was telling me something- swimmers, do you have any experience with this? Where you just feel your entire body go numb and your head go a bit loopy?

For some background this has happened to me before, typically if I double up on swims.

Thanks.

2

I have not seen a post about this, but perhaps some of you have experienced this before. I had a three workout day today, it was supposed to be two swims and short run. The swim in the morning went very well- 3200 total, main set was short and sweet, 12x100 holding 1:10/100 scy throughout leaving on the 1:20 interval. I did not feel whipped after this, and the run was also fine about 4 hours later (just a 30 minute run on a golf course near my house). I proceeded to the pool for my evening workout, which was to be an aerobic set, 10x400 yds to add some volume for the day. I was actually feeling quite good up through the first two reps, but on the third and fourth I was moving at the same pace but I felt a slight numbness set into my arms and legs.

It’s difficult to describe, but it felt like I couldn’t feel the water anymore with my hands and forearms, as if the nerves were dead, even though I was doing the same number of strokes and same speed. Coupled with that I had a sensation of anxiety come over me that was intense in spite of my attempts to breathe through it by focusing on relaxed exhaling under the water. I am not sure if this is really “bonking” because I feel that I did a good job of fueling throughout the day (I had eaten three meals and a snack up to that point with plenty of protein and carbohydrate). Needless to say I hit some kind of wall and my body was telling me something- swimmers, do you have any experience with this? Where you just feel your entire body go numb and your head go a bit loopy?

For some background this has happened to me before, typically if I double up on swims. Thanks.

Nah, the numbness feeling you described has never happened to me at all, ever, but I am curious: did you finish the 10 x 400 set, and if so, what kind of pace did you hold??? Also, did you feel better after getting more to eat and drink??? Perhaps it was hypoglycemia despite your thinking you’d eaten enough, as you might be under-estimating your caloric burn on your swims. The closest thing I’ve had is the occasional hypoglycemic reaction (e.g., feeling hot and anxious) if I’m super hungry pre-workout, and then eat something really high in sugar right before the workout. In fact, that’s happened often enough that now if I need a snack pre-workout, I eat something like a PB&J sandwich, or just a few spoonfuls of PB, which stays with me a lot longer. Also, I absolutely NEVER eat syrup on pancakes/waffles but rather just butter and/or PB. Those syrups are just way too high in sugar for me; a Coke or Mountain Dew is no problem but those syrups are just too much.

3

So for that morning’s 3200 swim the rest of the set was done at 1:20/100 yds or slighly faster (minus the kick during the warm up)

1000 free, 200 kick, 300 pull
12x100 on 1:20 (1:09, 1:10, 1:10,1:10,1:10,1:10, 1:11, 1:10, 1:10, 1:10, 1:10, 1:10)
500 paddles and buoy

For the evening I only got through 4 of the 10 400’s (holding 1:20 again) before I felt so anxious due to the numbness of my body that I had to hop out. I will take your advice though and try something sweet before practice to get my blood sugar up- I had issues with hypoglycemia in the past during one particular race that put me in the hospital and caused a DNF. Thank you for the advice ericmulk- I am trying to become a better swimmer as that is something I did not grow up doing, so naturally I think it would be useful to get in more yardage and shoot for another set later in the day. It’s super hard to do really long workouts solo all the time, so doing a quality set like the am workout and then some aerobic work in the evening just makes sense to me.

4

Something similar happens to me sometimes on the run and in an 8k swim I did early in the season. It also occassionally happened when I was an age group swimmer at the end of the second swim workout. = I’d have an almost out of body sensation, or there was a sort of lag between my body and my mind. Flip turns were freaky in that my body knew what to do but I’d get a surprise when I’d hit the wall as i wasn’t expecting it… which is weird…

Either way… it was all solved with a bit of coke/ gatorade and i felt much better, so Hypoglycemia was the culprit. I do the PB sandwhich or something a bit heavier before sessions now to avoid it, but bring a gel as a back up in case it happens.

5

Great feedback, thank you so much- I will definitely bring Gatorade and take a snack for the second swim workout of the day. Thanks!

6

So for that morning’s 3200 swim the rest of the set was done at 1:20/100 yds or slightly faster (minus the kick during the warm up)

1000 free, 200 kick, 300 pull
12x100 on 1:20 (1:09, 1:10, 1:10,1:10,1:10,1:10, 1:11, 1:10, 1:10, 1:10, 1:10, 1:10)
500 paddles and buoy

For the evening I only got through 4 of the 10 400’s (holding 1:20 again) before I felt so anxious due to the numbness of my body that I had to hop out. I will take your advice though and try something sweet before practice to get my blood sugar up- I had issues with hypoglycemia in the past during one particular race that put me in the hospital and caused a DNF. Thank you for the advice ericmulk- I am trying to become a better swimmer as that is something I did not grow up doing, so naturally I think it would be useful to get in more yardage and shoot for another set later in the day. It’s super hard to do really long workouts solo all the time, so doing a quality set like the am workout and then some aerobic work in the evening just makes sense to me.

Well, if you did not swim growing up, you’re doing some excellent work there, holding 1:10s leaving on 1:20 is very fast for an “adult onset swimmer”. Moreover, you are to be very highly commended for doing 2-a-day swims, since this is almost unheard of for a tri-guy!!!

If you actually had to DNF due to hypoglycemia, then wow, you really do need to eat more in general, and more often. One thing though: I was NOT recommending to eat something sweet to avoid the low blood sugar but rather the opposite: eat peanut butter or something similar that will stick with you. Whenever I’ve tried to eat a high carbo/low fat diet, I have always had issues with my blood sugar going up and down, up and down, all day, and it did not seem to matter whether the carbs were “complex” or “simple”, they both just rocketed through my system. When I went back to eating a “normal” diet with a fair amount of fat, I was just fine. I don’t track my %fat, carbs, protein, etc, closely anymore but I would estimate that I’m eating around 50% carbs, 40% fat, 10% protein, and this seems to work great for me.

Whenever I read all these articles about “eating healthy”, which usually means lots of fruits and vegetables and low fat/low calorie, I just have to laugh because if I ate that way all the time, I’d lose so much weight such that I’d look like a concentration camp survivor. Obviously metabolisms, and exercise habits, vary all over the map:)

7

I’ve experienced this during a tough swim workout. My coach gave me some coke to drink. One time I ate half a Powerbar. Both gave me a lift and I finished the workout. All the best.

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Thanks tribeer- I will bring coke if its swim #2. Ericmulk, yeah I’ve been working at it consistently with low volume, high quality 3x week. Last November I was holding 1:15s on the 1:25/1:30 for that set. This week I’ve done that set Mon, Wed, and tomorrow I’m going to try to do 3x(6x100 first 3 on 1:20, 2 on 1:15, then #6 on 2:00) straight through- first time ever leaving on 1:15. I love how hard and unforgiving it is- sadistic I know, I have no idea why I think that’s so neat.

9

Thanks tribeer- I will bring coke if its swim #2. Ericmulk, yeah I’ve been working at it consistently with low volume, high quality 3x week. Last November I was holding 1:15s on the 1:25/1:30 for that set. This week I’ve done that set Mon, Wed, and tomorrow I’m going to try to do 3x(6x100 first 3 on 1:20, 2 on 1:15, then #6 on 2:00) straight through- first time ever leaving on 1:15. I love how hard and unforgiving it is- sadistic I know, I have no idea why I think that’s so neat.

You’re making great progress!!! That’s one of the great things about training in the pool, or running on the track: you know precisely how fast you are going. Do you ever do any 1000 yd time trials??? I think the 1000 is a great way to get a feel for what kind of pace you can hold. I gather that you must come to enjoy swimming???

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I suppose you could say that I am enjoying it- it’s a different kind of satisfaction though, to be sure. I don’t consider myself super talented, so it’s a very personal thing that I’m doing- I know that I will never be a super-swimmer, but I enjoy the grind and the strength I feel when I am dying and trying to hold on. I don’t care if people think I’m slower really, and it’s good to stay in shape. Definitely burns calories.

I think you are right on the money- I can throw in some of those 1000 yds tt’s but I would need someone to count laps because I lose track- my feeling is that I will not be able to hold that 1:10, but I’m hoping like 1:12-1:13 if I’m going balls-out. I may also need to throw in some longer intervals though like 300’s at threshold effort. I seem to slow down a lot over those longer intervals. I like the shorter intervals with really short rest because I think I have a short attention span :slight_smile:

11

I suppose you could say that I am enjoying it- it’s a different kind of satisfaction though, to be sure. I don’t consider myself super talented, so it’s a very personal thing that I’m doing- I know that I will never be a super-swimmer, but I enjoy the grind and the strength I feel when I am dying and trying to hold on. I don’t care if people think I’m slower really, and it’s good to stay in shape. Definitely burns calories.

I think you are right on the money- I can throw in some of those 1000 yds tt’s but I would need someone to count laps because I lose track- my feeling is that I will not be able to hold that 1:10, but I’m hoping like 1:12-1:13 if I’m going balls-out. I may also need to throw in some longer intervals though like 300’s at threshold effort. I seem to slow down a lot over those longer intervals. I like the shorter intervals with really short rest because I think I have a short attention span :slight_smile:

Just use the pace clock to keep track: 1:13, 2:26, 3:39, etc…really, not that hard:) I’ve swum 10,000 meters straight using that technique. Do an open turn on occasion if you need an extra sec to look at the clock. Also, you can use a Timex Ironman watch, I find I can see the time on my wrist while I’m flipping w/o slowing down at all. I use both with the watch as a back-up to the clock.

Glad you’re enjoying swimming in its own unique way and really, for 99.99% of all swimmers, it is a “personal thing”, since at most 0.01% or about 1 in 10,000 have any real chance of becoming a “super swimmer”.

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what would the swim times be in meters man that is as fast and congrats on the sets your punchjng out
.

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what would the swim times be in meters man that is as fast and congrats on the sets your punchjng out

Actually, beastneb was the OP with those times but I agree 100%, he’s moving right along at 1:10/100 yd on 1:20. So, respond to beastneb to congratulate him:)