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4 bust ribs on 24th Jan. Please remind roughly how long before I can plan to be back for some gentle road riding on a gravel bike.
I know the basic reply is when it stops hurting enough but it is a few years since I did a set of ribs at the same time rather than just singles and can't remember how much this extends the duration. I am looking at 6-8 weeks for the hand fractures and pins to heal up a bit.
Experiences and advice welcome
In my experience, ribs is a couple of months, but it's rare that it's just ribs in my experience, I often seem to do intercostal muscles at the same time, and those take months to give a comfortable riding experience 🙁
I am looking at 6-8 weeks for the hand fractures and pins to heal up a bit.
I'd say you could be doing easy road rides in about that time frame.
Nothing to stop you trying a turbo ride as soon as you feel ready, will keep the hand out of danger and still keep your legs spinning.
I just went with how much pain was bearable tbh!
I just went with how much pain was bearable tbh!
As above, never did 4 ribs at the same time though. My experience has been back on the bike after 2 weeks for smooth low risk trails (definitely avoiding rock gardens and funny friends 🙂 ), you're supposed to be doing deep breathing anyway to avoid getting lung infection. Memory is that pain just stops on the 6 week mark. Sounds like your hand is going to be the determining factor anyway. Happy healing.
[i]Nothing to stop you trying a turbo ride as soon as you feel ready, will keep the hand out of danger and still keep your legs spinning.[/i]
I would rather eat my own eyes from my head with blunt spoons 🙂
[i]intercostal muscles [/i]Yep - they are what hurts once the bones have knitted which is also why a set of 4 consecutive ribs hurts for longer than a single one. The single tends to be the fracture that hurts. Ribs 7 - 10 on the left with multiple fractures in a couple will also have lots of muscle damage and general weakness to flex painfully.
[i]I just went with how much pain was bearable tbh![/i] This ia my plan but want to try and decide to I plan alternative activities for a month, 3 months or a long term and slow recovery.
Bored at the moment and want something to do.
I cracked a couple at fort William in oct 2018. Like above ribs healed after about 6months but I still get problems with intercostals.They seem to pop out where the injury was if I lift anything at a funny angle. Then it’s sore for a week or so.
A watched pot...
Tai-chi? lots of nice breathing exercises 🙂
GWS
3 months for me but like said above its more the soft tissue and muscle damage than the bone
Broken ribs several times now unfortunately. 6-8wks is about right. Last time it eased off after about 5, then got worse again. No way I'd be riding after 2 wks on any of the occasions I broke mine (between 2 and 4 ribs each time).
It is down to how you feel, some breaks feel worse than others, last breaks i had were 3 on one side, didn't even really notice they were broken until an X-Ray due to other injuries showed them healing up nicely, time before that i had one broken and it was a nightmare to sleep with.
The main focus is just getting back and making sure you don't risk falling off and making it worse.