Does anyone else find that riding on the hoods of your road STI’s causes you sore thumb joints? I’ve been using 105s since the Autumn for my commute (which are quite wide) and have had a problem with my thumb joint ever since.

Someone else in my office has arthritis in most of her joints that she puts down to this (she has small hands so probably exacerbates the problem) but it got me wondering how common this was.

Does anyone have any exercises to sort my thumb out?

They can, but it’s generally a symptom of a wider set-up/position problem.

Is this your first roadie set-up?

I have arthritic thumbs and they are better on STi’s than MTB. I use one of those climbing grip exercisers, which helps a bit.

I had Tiagra STi’s previously, but these are much narrower as the brake cable went down the side. The bars are a bit wider than the previous pair so this could put my other tendons at a funny angle.

Its only on the left hand side so expect there may be another contributory factor.

As above, sounds more like a general bike-fit issue loading your hands up in a funny way.

i got the same thing

The older STI’s (Shimano 105 5600) were a lot more comfortable imo, but the newer ones I found too wide, especially the hydraulic ones.

I went back to flat bars.

Yep, sounds like you’re leaning on the hoods… I find that as the season progresses and my core gets stronger, I lean less and less on the hoods (riding a TT bike helps too), so maybe if you did a bit of core work it might help without having to change your bike or position too much.

It’s a very subtle thing but I definitely notice it…

The bars are a bit wider than the previous pair

Can you put the previous pair on, see how that goes? Bars should be basically the width of your shoulder blades.

It’s also easy to fall into the trap of having high-ish bars and a short-ish reach in order to get comfort, when in fact it can make things worse because you (counter intuitively) end up putting a lot of pressure on your hands.

It’s a trap I fell into, using a 100mm, flipped-up stem and it was never quite right. On a whim I stuck a 110mm on, flipped down, and dropped 10mm on the steerer tube (the latter because of a steerer cutting measurement oversight 😳 ). It’s much more comfortable, and I ain’t no skinny flexy racing snake.

You haven’t changed gloves have you? Autumn being cooler weather, and you’ve moved from differently padded summer gloves to something a bit more substantial?

To some extent its unavoidable – you are supporting your weight on the joitnt at the lower part of the thumb and manipulating the levers at the same time especially when braking – this puts a lot of stress on the joint and could cause wear. I have this from motorcycle riding