Vertigo and OWS?

Triathlon Forum
1

My background is swimming. Div. I water polo, been OWS swimming in LA for the last three years, sub 1:00 2 mile swims, done the Alcatraz swim twice and top 10 AG… all of which is to say I am a swimmer and have experience in cold water.

Last Sunday at IMAZ I experienced severe, debilitating vertigo at about mile 1 of the swim. Pulled out about 50 yards west of the turnaround, about 30 minutes into the race. Spent the next hour throwing up, and the next 8 trying not to throw up.

I was feeling 100% up to the race. I had been hydrating more, in expectation of the heat, and started salt pills on Saturday (took about 4 Succeed throughout the day). I tightened my goggles as I do for all OWS. My pace was comfortable, my HR was 148 when I had looked at it.

I am heading to the doc, but anyone experience this? Thoughts as to potential causes of vertigo? It’s sort of fucked me over and planted seeds of doubt for future swims, given that this was my strongest leg.

Never take any part of tri for granted.

2

Your inner ear is responsible for equilibrium, do you have an ear infection or anything?

sorry you had a rough day :frowning:

3

I had two sudden attacks last year. On the day before my birthday, I was in a meeting at work and within 15 minutes, I could not walk, vomiting constantly, head totally spinning and sweating like crazy. I had to be rushed to the emergency room.

One of the things they told me to do was to reduce salt intake and no caffine.

4

where were you staying? I’ve heard of people getting sudden vertigo from mold/fungus in the air ducts.

5

I am thinking along the lines of middle/inner ear infection, it just came on so suddenly (and with wicked bad timing to boot). Hopefully my doc can help out with this

6

There should be other symptoms also. Do you have pressure in the ears? How about ringing in the ears? Any hearing loss?

7

Hampton Inn Tempe on Scottsdale Road. Lots of athletes there, including about 10 from my group, not that that proves or disproves anything.

8

Nope. Nothing. When it started, I thought it was just seasickness, which I never got (long time diver).

Also, other than “alternobaric vertigo” on occasion while diving (ear pressure differential, expected and goes away within seconds) I have never had vertigo while swimming or otherwise.

9

Do you normally take salt pills the day before?

10

Hello ChrisM and All,

I had a similar experience and spent one night in the hospital.

Final diagnosis was that I had a virus infection that got to my middle ear but nobody seemed to know for sure.

I walked down to Lake Taupo in NZ to swim two days before the race. My swim was at sunup so I could get used to the the sight angles for the race.

I had not shaved for a 3 or 4 days and wore my ‘throwaway clothes’ from the Amvets thrift store.

After a short walk from the motel to the beach I put on my wet suit and swam for about 40 minutes.

The water did not feel cold and I had a good swim.

When I started to walk out of the water on the beach I felt woozy and got up to the park bench to change back into my old clothes.

I got so nauseaous that I could not get my wet suit off at first. I had the dry heaves.

I finally got my wet suit off and got dressed and started to walk back to the motel, carrying my wetsuit in a black garbage bag so I
wouldn’t drip on the motel floor.

I had to stop a go to my knees every so often to barf. I waved at some people out for a morning walk to get help and they turned around and went the other way.

When I got to the motel I had to cross the main road and there was so much traffic and I felt so bad I couldn’t get across the street and just sat on the curb barfing.

Some other people were coming down the sidewalk toward me and I waved for help … they turned around too.

Fortunately I was aquainted with the motel owner and his two small daughters were waiting for the school bus. They saw me and imitated my crawling around on my hands and knees and the owner came out to see what they were doing and they laughed and pointed at me on the curb on the other side of the road.

He came across the road and got me back to the motel and it was off to the hospital. The hospital gave me a treadmill stress test the next morning and said I was good to go and just had a virus infection vertigo incident.

The next day at the race I DNF’d at the 13 mile mark on the run as I got dizzy and sick again and figured discretion was the better part of valor on that day.

Moral of the story: If you get sick - wear nice clothes and shave or nobody will give you the time of day.

Cheers,

Neal

11

No. That’s the only thing different that I did. Only taken them during races, and those were Endurolytes, switched to S caps for IMAZ.

I did, however, take them sometimw during the week before, to see if my stomach handled them. Not sure if I swam after, but I am sure I did within at least a few hours of taking them.

The vertigo didn’t subside for a few days (very very slight). In fact, if I close my eyes and mave my head back and forth it still feels as if I am not 100% (been on post IM vacation so haven’t been able to see my doc)

12

The additional salt may have made your body retain fluids which could have caused a problem.

To get some relief afterwards if it happens again, you can take Meclizine which is over the counter and for more severe vertigo, you could have your doctor prescribe Vallium and Compazine.

Since my attacks, I changed my diet to eliminate all caffine and eat low salt foods. That has helped a lot.

13

No. That’s the only thing different that I did. Only taken them during races, and those were Endurolytes, switched to S caps for IMAZ.

I did, however, take them sometimw during the week before, to see if my stomach handled them. Not sure if I swam after, but I am sure I did within at least a few hours of taking them.

The vertigo didn’t subside for a few days (very very slight). In fact, if I close my eyes and mave my head back and forth it still feels as if I am not 100% (been on post IM vacation so haven’t been able to see my doc)

Have you banged your head lately? Is the vertigo “positional” (i.e. when you have your head in certain position)?

If so, look up “Epley Maneuver”. BTW, if you end up doing this, HOLD each position for a few minutes…my ENT doc didn’t when he guided me through it. Didn’t work. I did it myslelf at home and held the positions for a few minutes each. Bingo. No more vertigo.

http://www.dizziness-and-balance.com/disorders/bppv/bppv.html