Biking Body Malfunctions

Speeding around the hills of Raccoon Mountain or meandering down the Cloudland Canyon connector trail are a few of Chattanooga's mountain biking gems. The only thing worse than popping a tire on these trails is being injured while biking. There is no way to completely bullet proof your body, but taking steps to prevent future injuries will keep you on your bike longer.

BODY POSITION

To discuss bicycle injuries, we must first touch on positioning. One of the most important things you can do as a rider is to have your bike properly sized and tweaked for your body. If your set up is off it can cause a host of issues like lower back pain, iliotibial band syndrome, numbness in your hands, and knee pain. Check out a local shop and have a professional size you up. 

There is almost always constant hip flexion, ankle dorsiflexion, and shoulder flexion when riding. Our bodies are not built to hold riding postures for hours, let alone any postures, for long periods of time. The muscles will start to fatigue, eventually leading to bad positioning and possible injury. By no means am I telling you to sell your bike, I am trying to open your eyes to the areas of our body that need extra attention in warming up for a ride or cooling down after a ride.  There are many articles out there on proper body positioning while mountain biking completed by professional riders so check them out ….... 

Let’s get into why we’re here: to prevent mountain biking injuries.

Low Back Pain 

With any type of cycling, be it road cycling, mountain biking, or on the bike in a gym your lower back is in a compromised position. There is some research that points to over ridding as the culprit. If we ride too long, we can fatigue the hamstrings and calf muscles producing bad body position, knees out and a slumped forward lumbar spine. Another reason is fatigue in the deep lumbar supporting muscles called your multifidus. Our bodies are designed to change positions frequently. When you are riding excessive amounts of time with our spine under tension, these muscles will eventually fatigue. Again, this will lead to a flexed lumbar spine which increases the pressure on the discs and facet joints which can lead to localized low back pain and even sciatica. Improving your riding posture is as easy as gaining more core strength. The stronger our core is, the more stable the lumbar spine will be. When I talk about core strength, I am not discussing just your six pack. One of the most important muscles of your core is your diaphragm. Practicing deep breathing exercises will help train this muscle. Adding a core strength exercise routine that includes your glutes and preformed with proper breathing exercises 3-4 times a week can prevent future back pain. 

Hip Pain  

Take a look at your regular desk jockey, then look at yourself on a bike. See any commonalities? Hip flexion. Whilst biking through the hills your hip flexors are either actively short (you are engaging your leg to bring your knee to your chest), or passively short (they are resting in a shortened position). This is a twofold problem. Constant hip flexor shortness can lead to low back pain and/or hip pain. As you can see, the hip flexors, psoas and illiacus= iliopsoas, originate from your lumbar spine and insert on your hip. This constant recruitment can place the hip joint in a compromised position creating deep hip pain and it can also pull on your lumbar spine creating lower back aches. There is normally asymmetry in these muscles so stretching both may not be the answer. Warming up with leg swings and hip rotations will help bring some blood flow to the hip joint and get you primed for the ride and can alleviate hip issues. Post ride hip flexor stretches can also help. This is a tricky area to diagnose on your own. Seeing a sports chiropractor is essential to balance these tissues out and allow you to regain your balance on the seat.  

Knee Pain 

Even though cycling is normally a physical therapy exercise for knee pain, it also may be the culprit causing knee pain. Outside of a crash or bumping into a tree most knee pain from cycling comes from bad positioning, or overuse. The key is to know your limit and when you are tired slow down or stop. So many injuries happen when bicyclists get gassed because technique goes out the window and they compensate when pushing through. With compensation comes terrible form and with this you get recruitment of accessory muscles that wouldn’t normally be doing the pulling. Foam rolling is my favorite tool to release unwanted tension in my quads or hamstrings after a ride. IT band issues can normally be felt on the outside of the thigh and at times around the outside of the knee. Foam rolling the tensor fascia lata (TFL) muscle will alleviate this soreness. 

Shoulder Pain 

Unless you’re riding a unicycle your shoulders are in an active forward attack position the entire session. The attack position engages all the muscles surrounding the anterior shoulder. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand this position can lead to pain and discomfort after long periods of riding. If you can perfect a plank position and have flawless pushups you will be stronger and more stable through berms and switchbacks. If you can’t hollow out your arms activating your core muscles, chances are there will be a movement compensation and during demanding sections of your ride your shoulders may take some damage. There is so much demand on the anterior shoulder in riding we need to cross train and begin strengthening the posterior shoulder musculature. Performing rhomboid and lower trapezius exercises will help stabilize your shoulder. if we don’t equalize the anatomy forward rounded shoulders will present themselves and a possibility of numbness in your hands can occur. The shoulder is a very complex joint, see this link for more.   

Wrist Pain 

As with the shoulder we place a great deal of weight on our wrists. There are two bones in our forearm, the radius and ulna. It is essential to place your weight evenly when gripping your handlebars while simultaneously shifting the weight into your hips and legs. This shift will take weight off your arms and save your shoulders as well. There are mainly two nerves we worry about here; your median and ulnar nerves and a structure called your triangular fibrocartilage complex (TFCC). If you dump our weight on the pinky side of your wrist you can injure the TFCC or develop numbness in your pinky and ring finger. This is a complicated area to treat and will require a sports medicine doctor to help you regain proper movement through chiropractic adjustments and myofascial work. The best way to prevent this is to sit back in your seat and balance the pressure on your wrists.

As you’ve probably ascertained, a great deal of mountain biking injuries can be prevented by proper posture and riding position. Another cycling injury prevention technique no athlete wants to hear is rest. If you ride for too long it increases the chances of injuries from fatigue greatly. So be smart on the trail and to increase your odds of staying out there longer get in to see us at Crux Chiropractic to help put your body in perfect position.