Originally Posted by
soyabean
Upright means I was a giant air brake. [Hunched over as well, don't kid yourself]
This was an abrupt change, but allowed me to cut thru the wind.
My back hurt like hell during cycling and after cycling. I put up with it because it allowed me to do some decent top speeds.
About a month in, I got used to the pain and didn't bother me as much because I was feeling great from my endurance gain.
Sleeping on the floor with just a yoga mat really helped correct my back posture, as my sore back would be gone the next day.
As the weeks went by, my back muscles got stronger, and all pain disappeared.
See, my back muscles were weak and never developed from a lifetime of upright cycling.
I think it boils down to how much back pain there is for the individual. If they constantly end up screaming in pain to need morphine, I would seek professional advice from a gp and not BF.
But if it's just a sore back that appears to subside over a day or two, you're surely not breaking anything, and I would just cycle more.
The intuitive thinking that back pain means the back muscles are weak has been debunked. We now believe that weak core muscles allow a strength imbalance to develop between the core muscles and the back muscles. Most sedentary and moderately active adults have some amount of imbalance. The fact that you (nor the o.p.) mention doing anything especially targeted for your abdominal muscles is a huge red flag and discounts just about any conclusions you may want to come to about a cure for the problem. Very few people have 'weak' back muscles. We are bending over picking things up all day long. It is much harder to actually work the core as easily. Throw cycling into the life of someone who isn't also doing focused strength training of the entire body just emphasizes existing imbalances between muscle groups.