[Nick B]

Hey everyone! I'm Nick, I run for Woodbridge Shufflers RRC (great name!) in Suffolk and have been running for almost a year now. My favourite distance is 10km although I do really like the 6-9km cross countries we get in our local league. I'm going to university in September and will be joining the athletics society there. I thought it'd be a good idea to join this form for several reasons:

1.) its a V-bullitin forum, which I find really easy to use;
2.) the Runner's World forum seems to have a lot of bad vibes around it;
3.) I seem to have come to a fairly stagnant point in my progress in running: I want to be able to run more than 10km but I seem to get really bad stomach aches if I run anything more than 10 miles and my knee keeps on clicking and I'm worried that my cartilage is wearing away to nothing already (and for the record, I'm 19).

Any advice would be very welcome on my third point although I'm sure a quick search will yield some of the answers.

 

[Dan_R]

Welcome to the forum Nick, I'm not sure about your knee problem but what do you eat before going out for a 10 mile + run? Are you drinking enough fluids as well? Stomach cramps are sometimes caused by dehydration.

 

[Nick B]

I try to avoid food three hours before running 10 miles and I usually carry one of those handheld water bottles which can hold around 300ml of water which usually gets fully consumed.

EDIT: Its usually after running that I get the cramps and have to go to bed because they're so bad.

 

[Dan_R]

It is also possible to over hydrate, have you tried running without taking a bottle to see if that helps?

 

[Nick B]

Yes, I tend to vary the amount of water I carry on a run and have tried experimenting with other things such as removing phenylanine from my diet (which has a laxative effect so may disturb my digestive system), but as of yet, nothing has worked.