Vastus lateralis, vastus medialis Cramps

Hi Guys

I’ve been having daily vastus lateralis and medialis cramps since the 19. January during the whole day, which either start when walking down the stairs from my apartment or during normal life. Sometimes it’s just on one side sometimes both at the same time. I haven’t been on the bike since Friday and not been able to walk 200m without cramps… I’ve been drinking enough water, using lots of Sodium, taking 1200mg of Magnesium, and 1200mg of Calcium. I’ve took Vitamin D. I tried Hot bath, Massage, EMS, Stretching, Cupping and Taping of the said Muscles. I’ve also been taking 600mg of Ibuprofen because of the pain and since yesterday the Muscels start to feel sore muscels. I’m starting to get at the end of my knowledge and starting to feel annoyed and frustrated. Maybe you guys know something I didn’t try or am I missing something

Thanks for the Help

Did you happen to tweak your knee? My experience with a knee injury from a few months ago is that your brain will mess with the muscles around your knee to try to protect you from pain. I literally had trouble almost falling over because my muscles wouldn’t work the way I was trying to tell them to. I’ve read about runners literally falling down as if they had no coordination at all. And I noticed when applying pressure to them they were very sore.

That are no cramps, that’s rhabdo, most likely due to a genetic defect influencing carb metabolism. Check out this thread and be baffled how precise your symptoms match up: Extreme quadriceps starting pain after 3-4 rest days | Cyclingnews Forum

As soon as you mentioned going downstairs as a trigger, I knew what you were talking about.

If you get your blood checked, you will have very high values of creatine kinase, a marker for muscle damage.
I’ve been suffering from it myself. It can get very serious, but is manageable with some precautions (mainly keeping an close eye on carb intake and not taking too many consecutive days of rest). Episodes can range from anywhere between 3 and 14 days. Make sure to stay hydrated very well and go to the hospital if your urine starts turning red. As I said, it can get very serious and you can do severe damage to your kidneys.

If you catch an episode early enough, there is a way to stop it by jumping on a bike and doing a hard session (at least at sweet spot power, minimum an hour). It can get very painful, but the next day you will be OK except for some DOMS.

I had multiple hospital stays and pretty much every test there is done (EMG, muscle biopsy, genetic panel etc), no answers could be found.

I recommend reading through the whole thread above. There’s a lot to be learned from others how to manage and avoid these episodes.