Tingly Palms and Tender Other Parts 😮

Morning all,

Yesterday I bagged myself a 125km road ride and noticed along the way that I was getting pins and needles in the heel of my palm opposite my thumb, which I believe to be my ulnar nerve.  This began around the 80km mark and abated after repositioning my hand from the hoods to the flat area of the bar and giving it a bit of a open/close grabby flap for good measure.

This morning however I’ve woken up with a numb tingle radiating from the same area to the tip of my little finger which I suspect is the muscle/nerves way of telling me off and should pass once its had a bit of a grumble.  Moving forwards though, what can I do to mitigate this as I do enjoy a long ride but this is the first of this distance on my Free Ranger.  Thinking that gloves with some semblance of padded palm might be a good starting point as I was using a light pair of summer XC full fingers, any recommendations?

While we’re at it, I’m also a bit tender in the undercracker department today which I noticed becoming a little uncomfortable towards the end of the ride.  I’m guessing that some form of chamois cream might be the answer here before heading out on long ride and again any recommendations most welcome.  Is there anything that is particularly good to put on post ride or will any old moisturiser/hand cream suffice?

I’ve started using proper emollient cream on sore spots after riding, I’ve found it really good for skin recovery. I was using sudocrem, but this is much better.

It’s not surprising that you’d get some aches and pains after 80km – as your core fatigues you will tend to lean on the bars more. You could raise the bars by a couple of mm and see if that helps.

That would make sense as I definitely noticed I was slouching as it were and having to make a conscious effort to maintain posture; more planks and yoga needed me thinks.

As for an emollient cream, I’m guessing something without any alcohol that could be a bit stingy down there.  Anything in particular been standing out for you?

A decent bike fit will ensure that your contact points are in the right position for you, your shape and your bike. I use Andy Bishop at Worksop, well worth travelling as he’s half the price of more local options.

Core strength is also a factor to consider, though it also depends on how you build up to longer distances – building up slowly to 125k will hurt less than doing it as a one off.

I’m a big fan of chamois cream on any ride over 2 hours. Not just to reduce friction and chafing, but also hygiene, as most are antibacterial.  Its a dirty, hairy, sweaty mess down there if you are not careful. Get out of your horrible kit as soon as you can after you finish.

Stretching ASAP after a ride also helps I find.

As for an emollient cream, I’m guessing something without any alcohol that could be a bit stingy down there.  Anything in particular been standing out for you?

By ‘proper emollient’ I mean the likes of Diprobase or Cetraben. Shouldn’t sting at all really. If it does, that’s more of a skin break than a sore spot, and maybe needs a different approach to stop infection.

The other good thing about emollient is that you can use it instead of soap on sensitive areas.

Do not use Aqueous cream. It’s cheap for a reason. It will, over time, thin your skin and make things much worse.

In an ideal world, you’d probably get some sort of bike fit. Tingling fingers could be various stuff – a riding position that throws too much weight onto your hands is one possibility, another is that wide bars are making you cock your shoulders to compensate and that’s triggering a chain reaction that ends up with bent wrists and nerve pain.  How wide are the bars? How wide are you at the shoulders? You can try cocking your levers inwards slightly to make the bars effectively narrower when you’re riding on the hoods and see if that helps.

The undercarriage soreness could be loads of things – saddle too high leading to rocking, are you sore on one side or both? – saddle that throws weight onto your taint, saddle angle wrong etc. Or you may just be not used to time in the saddle. Chamois cream won’t fix that stuff.

Anyway, you can try more padded gloves, but conversely, the most uncomfortable ones I’ve ever used were the super padded, acclaimed Elastic Interface ones that Giro does, which actually caused more tingling for me. I get on with the no longer made Specialized Grail ones that have a pad in the centre of the palm to distribute pressure across the whole surface of the hand. Not made any more, but very good ime.

But it could all be down to all sorts of stuff tbh.

Try putting your saddle down by 0.5 to 1 cm.

i get numb bits if I have the saddle too high.