High lactate + CK in blood from hypertrophy training?

[maia249]

Hi

I got a blood test done recently due to an unrealated visit to the ER. I was informed I had high lactate (lactic acid) and a CK of 1078. I asked the doctor if it could be related to exercising at the gym. He promptly said "No as you are obviously not a pro athlete" then went on to admit he had no idea what could be causing it as I don't have any obvious severe trauma, and I have no known conditions that could cause it, am taking no medications that could cause it, and I don't think I have experienced any heart attack symptoms.

I didn't get the chance to explain what I actually do at the gym. I started taking training seriously again a few months ago after a several month break. I hired a personal trainer who  recommended for my goals to aim for hypertrophy. For this he suggested that I work out  5 days a week, whatever time I had for the workout, and lift weights that I define as HEAVY (for me) which he helped me recognise - I was told to basically aim for shaking and "discomfort"/wish to make the weight lighter. I was also told to do 3 sets of 8-12 (with 1 minute rests in between) for each exercise.
Things I'm choosing to do myself: an upper/lower split between days, aim to choose a weight that will cause me to reach failure, and I don't do heaps of cardio because I really hate it. 
I'm attempting to reach a calorie surplus. I have gained maybe 1.5kg of what certainly looks like a good proportion of muscle since I started this plan. Not only am I seeing a difference, others are telling me that I am very noticably more toned.

I'm wondering if maybe this training plan could be causing my odd blood test result or if anyone else has had the same thing happen. I will be seeking a second opinion from a doctor anyway but I want to know if I should raise the possibility of exercise being the cause.

[Heisman2]

Resistance training can definitely cause acute increases in lactate and CK.

CK: http://www.ismni.org/jmni/pdf/55/08KOCH.pdf
Lactate: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3918570/

Do you know how high your lactate was? Why did you go to the ER? How long after your last resistance training session was the blood drawn?

Try to take a few days off from the gym prior to getting the second opinion as if you take a few days off and the blood work goes to normal you don't have much to worry about. The only slight concern would be if you get CK levels higher than expected from resistance exercise; if this is the case you would also likely have more muscle soreness than most people and there are a variety of different underlying genetic conditions you may have to account for this.

[OldFartTom]

Warning: I'm not medically qualified and don't know what I'm talking about

Great link thanks Heisman2! I'd searched for one before (not sure what stupidity I was doing as I didn't find a good one) as another thread a some while ago had someone had been told by a doc they must have had a recent heart attack based on a moderately high CK test. I understand the value of these tests but the subset of the population who have very high protein consumption, take C supps and done some mega leg workout the previous day are going to score high blood CK, surely this is just common sense?

[dazitmayn]

Doctors don't know much about lifting in general and it is a part of their training to say hey "so and so chemical in your blood is high, this is not healthy and can lead to such and such condition".

Exercise and resistance training can definitely lead to higher CK levels that would be indicative of some sort of dysfunction, whether you are a pro athlete or not. If you just started to train, CK levels may see a larger increase from what your baseline is.

However, this is NOT to say that something couldn't be wrong. I think it is worth seeking the second opinion of a doctor or perhaps some additional tests MAY be warranted.

[OldFartTom]

There's Jon Sullivan, Jordan Feigenbaum and Austin Baraki and thousands of other less famous ones.

The problem is just like if you picked random people from the general population only a small proportion would understand, same with docs.

Probably lifting just isn't prioritised in med school like it could be. Maybe if they all had to DL double bodyweight on graduation day to pass, they'd take more interest