"joel roth" <
[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> I'm beginning to feel some numbness in my hands during/after rides, both on my road bike and
> mountain bike.
>
> Any suggestions? I don't have aero-bars. Do they help significantly?
If you get numbness in your third, fourth and fifth fingers, this is ulnar nerve neuropathy,
commonly called "handlebar palsy". I started to have problems with this two years ago when training
for a double century.
After talking to my doctor, and reading about it (put ulnar nerve or handlebar palsy in a search
engine) and working to counteract it, here's what I recommend:
o Make sure you have your wrists positioned properly: you always want your wrists straight and
your elbows bent. (When I did water aerobics we called this "Barbie arms" after the 11.5 inch
fashion doll -- you want to have a loose feeling in your arms, not a stiff one.) Especially check
yourself when you're riding with your hands on the tops of your drop bars. It's especially
important to have this sort of loose feeling in your arms when riding over bumps -- I know this
from riding on the road and going over potholes -- it would especially true if you're doing more
technical mountain biking.
o Make sure your bikes fit well. Typical fit problems that can lead you to lean on your hands with
the wrists bent include: pointing the nose of your saddle down too much, having the seat too high,
or having too long of a stem.
o Make sure you have lots of gel in your gloves. The Trico gel gloves have been the best. Every time
I've used a bad set of gloves for a while the numbness returns.
o Change your hand position frequently. Aerobars could help with this I suppose, but just changing
from being in the drops, tops, and hoods help. If your mountain bike doesn't have bar ends, maybe
putting some on would help because you'd have additional hand positions.
My doctor also recommended not riding for 6 weeks. I think I lasted two days.
--
Warm Regards,
Claire Petersky
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