Originally Posted by
Iride01
What did you do to try and build up muscle in that hand? It isn't going to happen just holding on the the hoods or bars.
While a majority seem to think that getting weight off of your hands is the magical solution, I don't.
A large bend in elbows helps absorb the road bumps that hands and shoulders would otherwise bear. Palms in a vertical plane along the sides of the hoods also helps.
Getting back to strengthening that hand, you'll need to do some real hand exercises. Not just hope that it strengthens itself while doing nothing. I've almost always found that strengthening the muscles around the part of my body that is annoying me helps with any pains I might have.
It's a fair point re: exercise. Obviously worth factoring this in and trying to build up some muscle / endurance.
Originally Posted by
genejockey
It's hard to tell without more information, BUT I'm your height and I ride 58 and 59cm frames, with 110-120mm stems.
If you put the bike on the trainer, and while spinning along with your hands on the hoods, can you lift your hands off the hoods and not fall on your face? Ideally, you should be able to hold your torso at the same angle as you would if your hands were on the hoods, even with both hands behind your back. Also, how much drop is there from your saddle to the bars? And when you've been riding for an hour or so, do you find yourself preferring to ride on the ramps or on the curve, more than the hoods? If you're in the drops, can you comfortably pedal at a reasonable speed for at least a mile?
One other observation, which is that what you might think the problem is may not be it at all. I got a new bike back in the summer of 2020, and my first ride, with the bars as high as they'd go (maybe a 2" drop from saddle to bars). My hands kept going numb, really quickly. This never happened on my other bikes, which had drops of 3-4 inches. I lowered the bars by moving 2.5cm of spacers from below to above the stem, and the numbness went away. So, it's not necessarily that your bars are too low, but they still might be in the wrong place.
I tried to hold the position on the trainer and I can do it ok. I don't have brilliant core strength, so it wasn't exactly a position I could hold for long, but I wasn't falling onto my face. I can certainly apply much less pressure onto my hands when pedalling hard - but obviously can't pedal hard all the time.
There is definitely a drop from my saddle to the bars. Just eyeballing it with a golf club placed on the saddle, it could be as much as 8 cm. I have moved the bars up throughout this process using the spacers, so they are maxed out and have been lower previously. Therefore I can see how a larger bike will mean I can have a lower saddle relative to the bars.
I have also spoken to another cyclist tonight who has had this problem occasionally. He has gotten results with bigger tyres and a bit lower pressure, as well as double bar tape - all to cut down on the vibrations. Has also suggested tubeless tyres and a suspension device that can be fitted to the stem to reduce vibrations further. Could be that a number of different factors could all improve things and there is no magic bullet.
Can hopefully get a loan of a larger bike this week.