Solving Hand Numbness for Cyclists
hi I'm filbert and today we're going to talk about a common problem that people experienced it's cycling which is numb hands now the reason where you get numb hands is there's a nerve just underneath this pad here skin at the bottom of the thumb which when it's put too much pressure on there gives that nerve gives the in prepping the yeah five pins and needles or numbness now number some number some say really long ride when you've been in the saddle for a long time it's completely normal people take the hands off the handlebars shake your hand around and if it goes away that's fine but if you're having more problems with it like it's yeah pretty uncomfortable is falling your enjoyment of cycling or it's the last thing off the bike you really need to do something about that because it can can turn into a nasty permanent condition so what things can you look for in your setup that will help you alleviate numb hands or not good cause again so you're set up from front to back if you've got too much weight on the front of the bike I yourselves too high or too far forward or the front is too low far away that tends to Chuck you onto the front of the bike and one way people cope with that is by locking out their elbows if you can't ride Vout unlocking your hours I say another sign that it might be reason why you might have too much weight on the front and therefore getting numbness to try and change that bring your front end up maybe low and put yourself down a little bit look at the overall balance between the weight on the back and the front and try and get the bit of the weight off your hands alright you should be after as a general rule ride with your elbows flexed and nice and feel comfortable like that other things to look at are your handlebar width now if your handlebars are too wide you tend to splay like this to reach them and again that produces more pressure here which you can port on handsgeneral rule the hanna-barbera shouldering when you're riding and we yeah there are quite a few different handlebars 38 40 42 a big guy might write a 40 for most people around the 40 42 some small people to 38 and then we need to look at your hand your hood position if you're riding on the hoods when you're down on the hood you should have to reach too far to the hood to the hood to be round the drop that can often if it's too far round like this that can cause a problem and again illustrate numbness if it's too far back as well though and it's jamming you up and pushing in to get to the femurs that's good cause numb hands so looking at that the hood position overall so we view hoods the optimal position is like this nice and comfortable it's a wonderful economic aid she feel comfortable to the grip and you can break easy if you get in numb hands look to see if you've ran to reach around to the hood if you're here and you're having to really flex your wrist from this derivatives and that's going to cause problems same as if you come back here in the hood is jamming you up into this position so the wrist is being forced into this position here I'll produce more pressure in here so you should feel comfortable and fairly neutral position around the wrist other than that things that can help alleviate that there aren't earlier your position are there are some range of gloves specialized maker a nice glove that has a little bit of gel in here and I can help with the problem but try to look for the root cause because gel gloves and things are that are actually just dealing with the symptoms
Article image and text sourced from YouTube Creative Commons.
Text and image source: Phil Burt Innovation. License: CC BY 3.0