Cramp

"mb" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Lately, I've been getting cramp during and after cycling. I always used
to get cramp, but not as much and not at such an early stage eg. after
about 80kms of admittedly hard cycling (and sweating).

I don't use salt on food or in cooking and I'm wondering if I'm getting
enough? I've been using Gatorade isotonic drink (powder), which, if I'm
reading correctly, lists 11.3% RDA of chlorides per litre of mixed
drink. I usually mix it at two thirds strength or so and take 1 litre
and 1 litre normal water.

Am I getting enough salt? Sounds like a strange question, given we're
accused of eating too much.
I sweat like a proverbial pig while cycling and try not to eat too much
[censored].

--
Mike
Van Tuyl titanium Dura ace 10
Fausto Coppi aluminium Ultegra 10
Raleigh Record sprint mongrel
Huissoon project bike (in bits, natch)

Hi,
I sympathize with you. For a long time, I too suffered from cramp. At
the 40 mile mark it used to rear it's ugly head. Initially I used to drink
SIS PSP22 and then changed to SIS GO. I take magnesium leading up to a long
ride and eat bananas en route. I too didn't use much salt in cooking but
have now increased my salt intake. Some people sweat profusely. I'm a
running waterfall when playing 5-a-side.

Good Luck!

Cheers

Peter.

mb said:

Am I getting enough salt? Sounds like a strange question, given we're
accused of eating too much.

Cramp is on the rise, particularly in schools and other institutions
where they're deliberately trying to reduce people's salt intake. It is
easy to go too far.

Two simple things you can try:

(1) Lick your arm when it's sweaty. If it doesn't taste salty, you need
more salt.

(2) Simply have some more salt before you start riding, and see how you
go.

Note that bananas are particularly high in potassium, so if lack of
sodium is the problem they may actually make the cramping worse (it's
the balance between the two that needs to be maintained).

Roger

--
Ever bike? Now that's something that makes life worth living!
-- Jack London

On 16/09/2007 13:55, mb said,

Quoted message said:

Am I getting enough salt? Sounds like a strange question, given we're
accused of eating too much.

I don't often cramp whilst cycling, but used to get it afterwards. I
just munch a packet of ready-salted crisps at some point, and that seems
to prevent cramp OK. Even they seem to have much less salt now than
they used to, but presumably still have enough. I do also usually have
an isotonic drink in the water bottle, but the CamelBak just has plain
water in it.

--
Paul Boyd
http://www.paul-boyd.co.uk/

"Paul Boyd" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Am I getting enough salt? Sounds like a strange question, given we're
accused of eating too much.

I don't often cramp whilst cycling, but used to get it afterwards. I just
munch a packet of ready-salted crisps at some point, and that seems to
prevent cramp OK. Even they seem to have much less salt now than they
used to, but presumably still have enough. I do also usually have an
isotonic drink in the water bottle, but the CamelBak just has plain water
in it.

In the alps we took to putting a bit of salt in our normal diluted fruit
juice (50:50 juice to water) bottles. It seemed to help. (not too much
otherwise it tastes horrible)

We also eat crisps - you can tell you're down on salt when they taste
_really_ good.

cheers,
clive

Clive George said:

"Paul Boyd" <[email hidden]> wrote in message

news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Am I getting enough salt? Sounds like a strange question, given we're
accused of eating too much.

Quoted message said:

I don't often cramp whilst cycling, but used to get it afterwards. I just
munch a packet of ready-salted crisps at some point, and that seems to
prevent cramp OK. Even they seem to have much less salt now than they
used to, but presumably still have enough. I do also usually have an
isotonic drink in the water bottle, but the CamelBak just has plain water
in it.

In the alps we took to putting a bit of salt in our normal diluted fruit
juice (50:50 juice to water) bottles. It seemed to help. (not too much
otherwise it tastes horrible)

We also eat crisps - you can tell you're down on salt when they taste
_really_ good.

cheers,
clive

I think I'm odd, I actually really like the flavour of raw salt. Its
hard to know whether you're getting the right amount, especially when
exercising, because its hard to tell whats in your food, especially if
you cook most stuff from raw and have packets to look at. I started
adding a level teaspoon to 2 litres of water and it seems to help a
little I think. I always have salty sweat, I'd have thought that if
you didnt have salty sweat you'd be WAY down on salts.

CoyoteBoy said:

Clive George said:

"Paul Boyd" <[email hidden]> wrote in message

Quoted message said:

news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

> Am I getting enough salt? Sounds like a strange question, given we're
> accused of eating too much.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

I don't often cramp whilst cycling, but used to get it afterwards. I just
munch a packet of ready-salted crisps at some point, and that seems to
prevent cramp OK. Even they seem to have much less salt now than they
used to, but presumably still have enough. I do also usually have an
isotonic drink in the water bottle, but the CamelBak just has plain water
in it.

Quoted message said:

In the alps we took to putting a bit of salt in our normal diluted fruit
juice (50:50 juice to water) bottles. It seemed to help. (not too much
otherwise it tastes horrible)

Quoted message said:

We also eat crisps - you can tell you're down on salt when they taste
_really_ good.

Quoted message said:

cheers,
clive

I think I'm odd, I actually really like the flavour of raw salt. Its
hard to know whether you're getting the right amount, especially when
exercising, because its hard to tell whats in your food, especially if
you cook most stuff from raw and have packets to look at. I started
adding a level teaspoon to 2 litres of water and it seems to help a
little I think. I always have salty sweat, I'd have thought that if
you didnt have salty sweat you'd be WAY down on salts.

Actually looking at wikiwhatsit, the recommended salt levels for other
countries are ~1.5g/day as opposed to our 6. You'd expect them to have
problems with cramps all day long if they were near that 🙂

On Sun, 16 Sep 2007 10:12:37 -0700, CoyoteBoy <[email hidden]>

Quoted message said:

Actually looking at wikiwhatsit, the recommended salt levels for other
countries are ~1.5g/day as opposed to our 6. You'd expect them to have
problems with cramps all day long if they were near that 🙂

Or fewer cases of high blood pressure.

Andrew Price said:

On Sun, 16 Sep 2007 10:12:37 -0700, CoyoteBoy <[email hidden]>

Quoted message said:

Actually looking at wikiwhatsit, the recommended salt levels for other
countries are ~1.5g/day as opposed to our 6. You'd expect them to have
problems with cramps all day long if they were near that 🙂

Or fewer cases of high blood pressure.

Aye. Wonder what the stats show?

CoyoteBoy said:

Actually looking at wikiwhatsit, the recommended salt levels for other
countries are ~1.5g/day as opposed to our 6. You'd expect them to have
problems with cramps all day long if they were near that 🙂

Sure the other countries aren't showing their daily recommended amounts
in grams of sodium? IIRC, certainly in the US, the Nutritional Values
panel on food packaging doesn't mention salt at all, only sodium, and
1500mg sounds about what I remember what was on the packaging.

6g of salt is 2.3g sodium. Still higher, but not quite as
breath-takingly different.

--
Yes, the Reply-To email address is valid.
Oolite-Linux: an Elite tribute: http://oolite-linux.berlios.de

Dylan Smith said:

CoyoteBoy said:

Actually looking at wikiwhatsit, the recommended salt levels for other
countries are ~1.5g/day as opposed to our 6. You'd expect them to have
problems with cramps all day long if they were near that 🙂

Sure the other countries aren't showing their daily recommended amounts
in grams of sodium? IIRC, certainly in the US, the Nutritional Values
panel on food packaging doesn't mention salt at all, only sodium, and
1500mg sounds about what I remember what was on the packaging.

6g of salt is 2.3g sodium. Still higher, but not quite as
breath-takingly different.

--
Yes, the Reply-To email address is valid.
Oolite-Linux: an Elite tribute:http://oolite-linux.berlios.de

You could well be right Dylan, I'll have to check it out but i suspect
i may have falled foul of it.