Hand Pain - How to Address

[Medic_Pilot]

Howdy,

I am riding a MTB on roads. On some of my longer rides I notice that when I lift my hands from the bars and shake them I get pain that starts near the wrist and travels up to my elbo.

I notice it most if I am on a long climb. I do wear bike gloves that have a foam style pad.

I'm curious if this pain can be addressed by simply changing my hand position - maybe get a set of bar ends or something.

Could it be also that I need some gloves that have gel vs. foam pads? I'm not a techno geek who needs to have the latest craze in everything dealing with cycling. If the foam gloves work, I'll keep 'em. I'm just interested if anybody has experience with the gel types and what they thought of them.

Thanks for your help.

Clear skies.

Greg

 

[mpm]

Howdy,

I am riding a MTB on roads. On some of my longer rides I notice that when I lift my hands from the bars and shake them I get pain that starts near the wrist and travels up to my elbo.

I notice it most if I am on a long climb. I do wear bike gloves that have a foam style pad.

I'm curious if this pain can be addressed by simply changing my hand position - maybe get a set of bar ends or something.

Could it be also that I need some gloves that have gel vs. foam pads? I'm not a techno geek who needs to have the latest craze in everything dealing with cycling. If the foam gloves work, I'll keep 'em. I'm just interested if anybody has experience with the gel types and what they thought of them.

Thanks for your help.

Clear skies.

Greg

Hi Greg,

try to add bar ends, you will have other hands positions and it will help you to climb hills.

When you climb hills: ¿ Have you stay on the saddle ? Or stand on the pedals ?

Regards.

Marcelo

 

[cyclist45]

did you ride on any off-road and bumpy terrain? notice your ellbow.bend it so that the shock does not travel to the wrist...

 

[daveryanwyoming]

...I'm curious if this pain can be addressed by simply changing my hand position - maybe get a set of bar ends or something...

Greg,
Yes on both accounts. Get bar ends because they give you more options for hand placement and get in the habit of changing your hand position frequently while road riding. One big advantage of drop bars on road bikes is the variety of hand postions like grasping the brake hoods, holding the tops, cradling the top of the curve itself and a bunch of others not including the drops themselves which dont get used as much as youd think. Bar ends are the best way to get more options on a MTB. Some folks also like those figure 8 style bars for the same reason but I dont care for them much.

Also make sure youre not "dropping" your wrists. Its a common habit to let your wrists drop creating a sharp angle between the back of your hand and your arm. Its a quick path to carpal tunnel syndrome and all you have to do is make a point to keep a fairly straight line between the back of your hand and your forearm. Just tuning into this can alleviate a lot of wrist pain and numbness in the fingers.

BTW I dont care for heavily padded gel gloves. I just dont like that much padding but lots of folks do so its a personal choice.

Good luck,
Dave

 

[bigpedaler]

bar ends if you want -- it's your bike, do as you please. dude's right -- don't curl the wrists under; when your hands are on the grips, extend your fingers -- do they stay in line w/ your arms? if yes, you're OK there. bar height vs. seat height affects this, too, as does top tube length -- but i'm going to assume you're properly fitted to the bike. i used to run padded gloves, but proper grips do more. if you do pad, gel beats foam 8 days a week.

 

[j.r.hawkins]

I broke my scaphoid bone a few months ago (the bone inside your hand at the base of yoru thumb) and noticed tonight that it was damn sore partway through the ride.

The reason was that on the weekend I'd turned the stem upside down to get a lower handlebar position for road riding, but hadn't reinstalled the bar to back to quite the right position. The brake triggers weren't quite in line with the line of my arms from the shoulder to the bars, so that my hands were bent back slightly at the wrist with my index and middle on the brake triggers. This put an uncomfortable amount of pressure on the still partially knitted bone.

The moral of this longwinded story is this: make sure your brake triggers and shifters are positioned so they can be comfortably used while keeping your wrists in line with your arms and without having to tweak your wrists around to reach your braking and gearshifting equipment.