Lactic acid buidup? (Read 804 times)

I'm new to the forums here, although I've been using the logs here for a few months. I've been running for a year and over the past few months I've been building mileage in the hopes of running a half marathon this fall, and then a full one in the spring. So I ran just over 12 miles today, and while I was pretty gassed at the end, there was nothing unusual about the end of the run, but after I stopped running, I got real sore, almost stiff, and minutes after stopping I felt a severe burning in the upper area of my calves. It was pretty intense, but I took some ibuprofen along with the usual recovery shake, and about a half hour later the pain was totally gone... I just kept moving around the house and never sat down. Stretching didn't help, or hurt, really, and I didn't do anything more than my usual post run stretches. I was pretty well rested as well. This was the longest I've run to date. Two weeks ago, I ran a faster 10 miles in similar weather, a day after setting a PR in a 5K (25:36) and mowed the lawn after running... I've never felt any pains like this before, not even a lesser intensity or anything. I assume it was lactic acid buildup, but I wonder if anyone else has had this, and what I could do, maybe nutrition wise or cool down wise, to prevent this. Thanks in advance.

I'm experiencing subacute stiffness.

Right after a long run, my legs just throb and you can feel the heat coming off them. I choose to do nothing and within 5 or 6 hrs the throbbing and heat subside then the stiffness sets in. My thinking is it's your body repairing itself by rushing blood to the leg muscles. Why would you hamper this by slowing the blood flow down, by cooling off your leg muscles? Unless it truly is too painful just let your bod take care of itself. I'm sure in a thousand years people will laugh at some of the medical practices of today, just as we smirk at what they did a thousand years ago. MTA - Curiously I never get this Heat buildup after a short or medium distance run, even if they are done at a hard pace.

Because it works.

But if you let your body do what it wants to do, it may be more beneficial. For example impede the flow of blood and your body may say, "Well that's all I could do under the circumstances". While if you left it alone and gave it time to work it may have been able to do a better repair job. Maybe making the muscle a little stronge,r than it would in the body where repair work was cut short?

The problem is that the blood flowing to your leg causes TOO MUCH inflammation and swelling, far more than what your body needs to heal. Slowing the blood flow with an ice bath reduces the overexuberent inflammatory response.

And it makes for funny HTFU pics from Marcus.

Beavis: heheheheheheh.

Well, we know where the blood flow ISN'T going...