I have been diagnosed with a condition called External Iliac Artery Endofibrosis and while I wait for an overdue fix, I thought I should take the opportunity to increase awareness about the condition. If you have some of all the symptoms below, perhaps you need to see a vascular surgeon who is familiar with this condition (and they are not many):
• I am a fit athlete but I cannot maintain an activity where my heart rate exceeds about 150bpm over 3 minutes
• After about 3 minutes above 150 bpm, I am forced to stop as I develop extreme fatigue that leads to pain on the calves
• The fatigue later gets to the quads and hamstrings
• In some instances, I reach a point where my feet get numb – especially when I am on the treadmill and on the stepper when I spent about 1,5 hours training
• The symptoms are greater at the start when I have not warmed up and get better after about 30 min of exercise. The pace gets slightly higher and I can manage the climbs a little better but after about an hour and a half, my performance declines again
• On the bike, I can barely keep up on climbs with the most under-trained people I know. On flats it is much better when I have not fatigued. On the bike, the quads take the most strain
• I have gone from an FTP greater that 200W to below 100W. In recent times my power output average 85W over 1 hour at an average heart rate of about 125 BPM.
• I find cycling easier; Running presents the most struggle and I feel the effects (fatigue) many hours after the run – even under conditions where I was taking periodic rests
I describe my condition as an inability of my leg muscles to get sufficient oxygen to fuel my running and cycling effort - in essence, my legs run out of oxygen during increased effort due to limited blood flow in my external iliac arteries. See image below to see where the position of external iliac arteries.
(cred: : https://musculoskeletalkey.com/hip-and-pelvis/).
Warning: Not many Sports Medics and Vascular Surgeons are familiar with the conditions - save yourself the time, cost and frustration of being subjected to endless blood tests, scans, dry needling, physiotherapy, back operations, alternative medicine.