Broken collarbone recovery and riding bikes again

Boils down to what you want to ride, broken anything in the navigation system is a real problem (collar bone, wrist, thumb etc). If you’re just doing flat stuff then 12 weeks should be fine, however if most of your riding is proper offfroad / bike park stuff, then 6 months plus potentially before you’re back to full steam?

I mostly Ride trail centre and off piste stuff - Forest of Dean / Cwmcarn / Bourton Combe / Mendips plus a bit of uplift.

Appreciate I’m very much going to have ease back in gradually - I think my shoulder function so going to come back pretty quickly - it’s just when the bone is strong enough to stand up to bumpy stuff I guess.

My wrist is slightly unhappy at the moment too - not sure if I bashed it in the crash or it didn’t like being in a sling for 2 months or so. Going to ask the physio about it next time.

Also my little finger on the side I broke my collarbone won’t go straight - Inhot that and the finger next to it fairly hard in the crash. They didn’t feel broken / super painful but clearly something is up with it. Need to try and get that looked at next few weeks

Snap! I did my left collarbone badly at the Golfie on FRIDAY June 13th. Had it plated and screwed on July 1st. Did my first road ride since 4 weeks ago but despite the X-ray looking good the consultant told me not to ride for another 4 weeks as it won’t be strong enough if I came off…so I waited (turbo) and got 2 roadie rides in this weekend.

Been doing small weights as opposed to resistance as that’s what the physio said to do. Got another physio appt on 30th Sept and another X-ray on 20th Oct - that ‘should’ be that.

I could in theory ride off-road again now but kind of reluctant to commit as the chances of an off on slippy roots and rocks (and dark!) are pretty high, at least compared to the relative safety of a road bike. I’ll try that in 3 weeks or so on a dry day if there’s ever gonna be another one!

Broke mine, maybe ten, twelve, years ago, riding wet chalk on the Herepath down into Avebury from the Ridgeway, in December. Crashed hard, landing on my left arm and elbow, my shoulder hitting the side of my head hard enough to make my ears ring!

Picked myself up and rode the rest of the way down to where I’d parked the car, and thought no more about it. Being winter I wasn’t riding that much, but my shoulder was nagging at me, every time I picked up my bag it hurt, and eventually I saw my doctor, who said that I’d done something, but I’m getting older, don’t worry about it. I stopped noticing it hurting the following August.

I only realised I’d broken my collarbone last year, when I noticed a lump on the top of it last year… 🤷🏼‍♂️

This comes up on here reasonably regularly - unsurprisingly.

I broke my lefty twice. The first time I went the traditional NHS Father Time route and was back up and running (riding) in a couple of months. I broke it again 12 months later as it really hadn't healed properly despite the Xrays indicating it had. I had that plated and was riding road within a week. It's just soft tissue damage once it's plated but try not to fall off... I was very motivated to get back out as I'd a work sabatical/multi month tour planned 4 weeks after the re-break. Whilst away, one of the Japanese MotoGP riders broke one of his during a race, had it plated and won the following race 7 days later. So, it really depends on how motivated you are and your appetite for any complications should you choose to jump off again whilst it's healing.

Very variable with broken bones. Broke my pelvis badly in January, Early April back on turbo, late April out on bike. Mainly CX and commuting with some road. Not done any MTB recently, mainly as I've a badly torn rotator cuff too, and landing on that will snap it, meaning surgery and a long recovery.  6-12 weeks for full healing but be wary of crashing.

I think it all depends on how risk averse you are. I’ve fractured my collarbone twice. First time I was on the turbo three days later then on the bike outside, tame stuff, after 3 weeks. Second time I had a week off as I had a pneumo thorax. 

If you get paid to ride a bike you would be back outside riding very quickly. Leisure riders like us tend to be overly conservative. 

I'm in the injured club too. I broke my scapula/acromion and ribs in early august (hit by a car), it's healing fine without surgery but I'm starting to think about when I'll be comfortable getting back outside.

I've been riding the turbo for a few weeks and it actually feels more comfortable on the bike than walking, and although I don't have full shoulder mobility I am able to hold the bars, change gear etc. I just don't feel ready for outside yet, still too sore.

I’m relatively risk averse and don’t want to risk mangling it by riding too early.

Wondering whether by October half term I try a gentle leisure ride along the Bristol - Bath cycle track with my daughter.

Will wait for mtb until the consultant is confident in the strength in the bone for crashing with (relatively).

A mate is after an uplift day before the end of the year….not committing to that yet - but maybe thinking Flyup 417 is a better (less rocky / shorter rubbish less drops) idea than Bike Park Wales.

FoD would arguably give a little more in the way of variety compared to 417 without being nuts?

Yep fairly common: https://singletrackmag.com/forum/off-topic/i-am-welcoming-myself-to-the-broken-clavicle-club-questions-inside/

Mine was May 26. You can see in that thread it was quite a separation. After 12 weeks new bone growth has joined the two halves and consultant said it's as strong or stronger than before.  A friend did his the week after and had his plated. He still has a small fragment not attaching so he's been told to leave it another three months before (hopefully) the x-ray will show it fully healed.

Stuff that may or may not be useful based on my experience

- I really wanted mine plated because it had a fixed recovery time. I'm glad I didn't but it wasn't ever an option on the NHS. To be fair I got decent advice, the NHS physio has been excellent and I was very happy to be discharged with a healed if lumpy break.

- I have done A LOT of physio. Probably too much early on and aggravated my AC joint which hurt like an absolute ******* for about two weeks. It's mostly better now but still starts to ache about 90 minutes into riding. It is improving tho so I'm hoping ofr a full recovery

- I was incredibly tentative before I was signed off. I had the same "you can ride but you can't crash" message at 8 weeks where the new bone was still very soft. It made riding not much fun for me. I started off road at about 10 weeks just as I was going stir crazy on the turbo. 

- Now it's healed, I don't really think about it. We did a big day out in the Yat riding stuff I'd normally ride with some potential consequence if it went bad, and while I wasn't full on gung ho, I wanted to do it and my shoulder felt strong (if a bit sore). The point made about being risk averse was true for me. But I couldn't shake my physio saying "it's 75% healed, do you really want to go back to zero rather than waiting a few weeks?"

- I am still doing physio. 30 mins every two days. Combination of stabilisation and increasing weights. Lots of different exercises so I just pick what i fancy doing. Was strange picking up weights again after being told "no heavy lifting" for three months. I will carry on with the physio as it's doing my other shoulder (which is a bit crocked) no end of good.

- Recovery time. I went private and he said "a year until it's fully healed", a NHS doc said "12 weeks, you're pretty healthy, you'll be good to go", yet another "12-15 weeks for the bone, 6 months before it'll be full sorted"

My plan is not to crash on it again 😉 I have missed out on two fantastic MTB trips (one 4 weeks in, one very soon but I just don't feel ready for 5 days rock thrashing). And a fantastic summer. On the upside I have a good outcome and hopefully no long term issues. Also taken up swimming again and back into pilates and Yoga. So however annoyed I was when I did it (and I was VERY annoyed), I kind of wrote off the summer, made peace with it and decided I was going to play the long game and not come back too early.

TLDR: let it heal, do what you feel comfortable with, treat advice with caution and try and find some upsides!

I’ll add some photos - personally I’m glad I got it plated at this moment in time as everything was moving about prior to having it plated and any kind of transport (bus / car) was jarring it. Immediately after plating this became instantly more comfortable.

The pain the day after, the day after the operation was bad once all the drugs the hospital put in wore off - but started to improve fairly quickly.

That's quite a gap! I can see why you had it plated. Mine never hurt amazingly until the AC joined the party. It did grind a bit for the first week but then stablilised. That image is when I did it and about 7 weeks in where you can see new bone but it's very gray (soft).

I meant to comment before: I was advised to remove the sling after 3 weeks. Logic being it might be doing some good stabilising the bone but it's terrible for the shoulder. I was careful what I did with the arm, but I am very glad I wasn't in the sling for two months like you.

Yeah it’s hard yards on the shoulder getting mobile again but I’m making good progress with that now luckily. Using it as much as possible as well as doing the exercises I’ve been given