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For whatever reason (Bad cockpit setup being main suspect) I've got what the doctor thinks is Carpel Tunnel Syndrome.
It started with hands/fingers aching after rides but more recently I stopped getting that and instead suffer from tingling in the hands and fingers.
The tingling soon became chronic in no time. Not been back on the bike since, and it's still here 4 days later.
Has anyone had experience of this ?
Doctors advice was "dont do any mountain biking until the tingling stops and take 2x ibuprofen 3x per day" and that was it
Had an op to cure mine.
Long term I thought that was pretty much the only option?
Not that I'm medically trained! Lol
Mine has been going on for years and has now got to the stage that surgery is in the near future, just waiting for the date! I think mine started off from wrist injuries snowboarding but has steadily got worse. The pressure put on your wrists from leaning on them, whether it be riding the bike, motorbiking or even pressups soon brings it on, as does lying down sleeping now unfortunately. If yours is in its infancy you might be able to abate it for a while (or even stop it progressing altogether) with anti-inflammatories and rest now. It's caused by a restriction in the area of the wrist that some tendons go through but more importantly the nerves are there too. As far as I understand it the tendons run through sheaths that can get inflamed due to over-use or other problems. This inflammation then puts pressure on the nerves resulting in tingling, numbness and 'pins & needles'. You eventually end up dropping things and feel like you've sausages for fingers so doing anything intricate is a bit of a challenge. Do something repetitive and especially percussive and it gets far worse for an indeterminate period of time. I speak from experience.
I am not a doctor but if you can get on top of the issue now you may not end up like me!
Self refer to physio first and get them to work on it then ask for a referral to the nearest specialist. There are nerve tests and other things that can be tried. Steroid injections happen here before surgery. Good luck.
It might not actually be carpel tunnel but that is suspected. But there is only 1 symptom of carpel tunnel which is the tingling but none of the other symptoms.
It seems like I pick up injuries really easy. Low back pain I've never been able to get rid of. Then I had a pain in my right-hand neck that started 2 years ago and it won't go. Then this tingling came on about 4 days ago and I'm beginning to think it's permanent as well, because every other pain I get seems to be.
My wife suffers. Had an operation on one side....which helped a lot. She finds that wearing wrist guards helps her a lot, rather bizarrely. we theorise they help keep her wrists straughter and therefore not pinching the nerves so much during riding. Her problems usually come on worse overnight, the day after riding...not necessarily during the ride.
Got it too. Did south > north Wales a year last February by myself and carried too much stuff on my back. Came on after that ride and has never really left.
Doctor says carpal tunnel, physio thinks it could be where the nerve goes through higher up near the shoulder. PITA 🙁
Going to hit some hard upper body exercise to see if I can do owt about it. If it is the carpal tunnel itself then there's little to do methinks. It'd have to be a lot worse if I was going to opt for surgery.
Lower back pain was cured by pilates btw. Hit that old-woman exercise class hard. It's core-strength tastic and properly magic wiz0rd 😉
Same. Try rolling your bars forward or back to align your wrists arm and shoulders in a straight line. Worked for me. Took some time to go away but it worked. It might be your bars are too wide or narrow. Your on the right track, it's cockpit setup
I went to 4 local bike shops before I got one who was willing to help me with handlebar backsweep on my handlebars (non-riser). He identified that they were in the wrong position and adjusted them accordingly by rolling them (not sure what is classed as forwards or backwards).
I've not a clue about backsweep but I suspect I could have messed this up when I changed the stem recently (from a 75mm to a 40mm).
I've tried cutting my bars down as well. From a wide 760mm originally to now a rather average 730mm.
Not been on the bike to see if rotating the bars has helped yet as I'm worried it will make the symptoms worse. But when I do get back on it again I'm going to concentrate a lot on not putting pressure on the hands and keeping the wrist and hands aligned.
Physical therapy helped me a lot. A combination of exercises, stretches, and Graston deep tissue massage made the tingling go away for me. I wanted to avoid surgery if t all possible.