Old 08-02-22, 09:24 PM
  #12  
Carbonfiberboy 
just another gosling
 
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I've had varieties of back pain over the years, including diagnosed sciatica. The only thing I've ever found which produced real results was walking. Yeah, walking. I think the thing about walking is that is has to be a symmetrical exercise or we can force it to be one if it's resistant. And it's easy to tell. No bike fit issues. My method is to walk at a moderate pace maybe 3 times a week while revolving each hip with a more or less circular motion in the fore-and-aft plane. I don't care what it looks like. The first time I did it, it hurt like the very devil for about a mile, then got better. I gradually increased the distance to 5 miles at a 3 mph pace, then increased the pace to 4 mph. This took most of the summer. I used a neighborhood with about 200' of gain per mile, round trip.

That was a few years ago. The back pain hasn't come back, maybe because I walk or hike in the mountains at least once a week. This past year has been a bit sucky for me because I couldn't seem to fit strength training in, the first year in decades. My big events are over for the year and I'm getting back in the gym this week. Strength training is another one of those things which has to be symmetrical. You're forced to perform perfectly symmetrical movements with resistance - you use a mirror. I think that's key.

Yuri's idea of using ibuprofen as a diagnostic aid is a good one. I've done that many times myself. If the pain goes away, it's almost certainly a tendon/tendon sheath issue, IOW tendonitis/tendinosis depending on how long it's been going on. With a self-diagnosis of tendon issues, you can try a self-programmed treatment plan, which is better than "I have no idea." It either works, validating your diagnosis, or it doesn't, with the opposite result. I like yes/no things, maybes being useless.
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