Had a big off on the road bike on saturday and have cracked 3 ribs. Pretty much cant bend, twist, laugh, cough, sneeze or lie down without being in agony so riding a bike isn’t really an option yet – was wondering how long i should expect this initial pain to last for and when i can hope to get back on the bike again

I asked the doctor who said expect about 6-8 weeks to heal but was quite vague about returning to exercise before then. Reading between the lines i think he was saying it might be ok but not something that he wanted to outright recommend incase i am back in a few weeks time complaining about feeling worse for going back to soon.

Also have the london marathon (my first ever run over 10k) in mid April but at the moment i think i’ll need to pull out of that 🙁

Can’t remember with mine. But I do recall it was, like you say, agony doing all the little day-to-day things. First few nights sleep aren’t fun. And you might like to get an electric toothbrush 🙂 and a flunky to put yours shoes on for you.

Took me about 5 minutes to put my left sock on this morning 😀

When I first did mine it was about 2hrs into a 10hr MTB Enduro. I finished 5th then wondered why I was in agony… 🙂

About 3 weeks for me on both occasions that I’ve cracked ribs. Which I managed to do in exactly the same place each time, there’s a lump of bone there now where it’s healed. I was out on the road bike reasonably quickly, it took longer to get back into MTBing, the jarring of off-road riding wasn’t conducive to a pain free day!

Broke ribs in Canada and was riding the next day albeit under the influence of codeine and sodium diclofenac. To say it was painful is an understatement, however i’d travelled several thousand miles so a certain amount of MTFU had to be employed.

I’d say when you can comfortably ride without causing yourself undue pain.

Ribs take ages to heal unfortunately and it’ll be the sneezing / coughing and f*cking hicupping you notice for the longest.

However from experience if you continue to ride DH and crash they take even longer…

You’ll be back on the turbo inside a couple of weeks.

You’ll be back on the road clicking and wincing inside three weeks.

By six weeks you’ll be fine.

Assuming you don’t have complications.

But…if you crash inside that time. God help you.

SB – wearing the tee shirt.

Depends! I’ve broken ribs three times in the past two years, and each time was as you describe. Just pain. However, after a week I was out trying the bike and found that it was oddly completely pain free even though sneezing, sleeping, driving etc. hurt like Billy O. Each time I bust a rib it took around 6 weeks to heal, but by then I’d been on the bike at least a month. Obviously you have to watch what you do, and I’d say leave it until you’ve begun to sleep properly, and if it hurts then stop instantly!

Good luck my friend, and don’t push it.

http://www.muddyground.blogspot.com

I just hope you are OK before the pollen season! When I did mine I also had hay fever for about 2 weeks 😯