[Shmoe]

Exact same sping rate and oil. I was getting mostly hand pain with a little arm pump (I think this was due to my brakes to tell you the truth..).

I was pretty surprised myself when I changed forks, what kills me is the small bumps and the shiver seemed to solve this. Im not saying to go buy a shiver, just that suspension set-up means quite a bit.. This is the only reason I dont have a Sherman Slider as I fear the SPV will bring back the pains.

 

[gschuette]

Read Ogrippers post. Running in the brake levers is a godsend. i love my Intene grips far better than the ruffian and OURY versions I tried earlier. Stretch your fingers before riding and work up to the big braking runs, don't do the sketchy runs first. Helped me anyway.

 

[Greyhound]

I'm no doctor, but I DID stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night........



IMO, a lot of people overlook one of the most obvious contributors to arm pain/forearm pump, whatever....is the fact that you're subjecting a part of your body to a isolated, exaggerated condition that it doesn't normally see on a day-to-day basis. Even though you may ride everyday, you're not doing multiple DH, lift-assisted, blast through the madness runs everyday. Think about how bad your calves and thighs hurt the first day skiing/snowboarding every season....your legs just aren't used to being forced to work as hard in such an isolated, dynamic manner. The same condition exists when you're pointing your bike down a 20%-plus grade at speed, through choppy conditions. Your forearms are forced to load a larger percentage of your body's weight when you're pointed down like that.

Now, keeping all of this in mind......we'll step over to the point of larger vs. smaller diameter grips in relation to this condition. Make a fist and squeeze for two minutes lightly: feel that forearm muscle contract? Now open that fist up, like you're gripping a tennis ball and hold it for two minutes.........the forearm is utilizing those muscles in a more dynamic fashion to maintain that position. Tennis players, golfers, baseball players.......all those guys want their hands as close to the implement doing the work as they can get for a better feel. So, in my opinion, if you're pointing downhill with your weight bearing on your hands and forearms(with legs supporting their fair share)and subjecting them to repeated, violent conditions, while gripping a thicker grip, you're putting those muscles in a position where they are more likely to be strained quicker, than from normal riding. Thinner grips allow the muscle to relax, and perform more like a bench press than a push-up.

But......this is all B.S. cuz it's the Internet. :nuts:

 

[zedro]

I'm no doctor...

But......this is all B.S. cuz it's the Internet. :nuts:

oh sure, ruin a perfectly sound and well thought out post....if only the Pinkbike crowd had such modesty....

 

[Toshi]

IMO, a lot of people overlook one of the most obvious contributors to arm pain/forearm pump, whatever....is the fact that you're subjecting a part of your body to a isolated, exaggerated condition that it doesn't normally see on a day-to-day basis

...in my opinion, if you're pointing downhill with your weight bearing on your hands and forearms(with legs supporting their fair share)and subjecting them to repeated, violent conditions, while gripping a thicker grip, you're putting those muscles in a position where they are more likely to be strained quicker, than from normal riding. Thinner grips allow the muscle to relax, and perform more like a bench press than a push-up.

good post, some interesting thoughts here. i agree with you in that the sudden increased strain, of whistler especially, is an aggravating factor. however, i don't quite follow your grip reasoning: what is "the muscle" that is allowed to relax with thinner grips? when i relax my hands they don't tense up into fists naturally...

 

[Alloy]

I agree with the guy with the Shiver. I used to get really bad arm when back in the late nineties when I ran manitou efc fork. After that I got a psylo and it was a little better, I could sord of get my hands off the bars at the end of the run, "at the time I though it was great." Next I got a z1 and suffered even less arm pump, now I could brake through bumps, it was getting better. Then I went to a triple 8, thier was no difference at first... I mucked with it a little, I tried 10wt oil, the fork got harsher, my hands hurt more. Recently I changed the oil to 5 wt and I haven't noticed any arm pump what so ever.

So heres what I'am getting at. Most of us could probaly clamp our nits down on a stationary bar for long period of time and not feel any pain. But if you start shaking and pulling that bar around it's gona hurt and the harder the bar is shaked and pulled the more it's gona hurt. So hit the problem at the source, get a smoother fork.

As for grips, I wear XL gloves and run a pretty wide grip. I use Intense lockons with about two layers of hockey tape wraped around them.

 

[mtbman4]

does your pain on riding days get better when you straighten out your fingers? if so, then it seems pretty clear that larger grips should help, altho i'm not positive by any means that the difference between ruffians and rogues will be great enough to really effect the pain.

I have used both, and the ruffians are quite a bit smaller than the rogues. With the rogues I found it harder to hang on through rock gardens. PS- I have a normal sized hand.

 

[Supa8]

If my levers are not rotated correctly I will get the same feeling at the end of my fingers. I also switched to Intense lock ons from rufffians and now have happy hands and fingers.

 

[SuspectDevice]

what would poor technique be, as relates to finger pain and/or forearm pump?

not quite a frontal view, but shows that indeed run my brakes right up against the bars, and shifted inward for maximum leverage. once again, it's not my braking finger that hurts.

here is a side shot of my canfield, which unfortunately shows nothing due to the perspective distortion of a 12mm lens . if you go back to the first shot it looks, to me at least, like my wrist is pretty straight/neutral. not doing anything too weird there.

Poor technique is holding on the the bars too much, and riding too upright (i.e. improper weight distribution). A corollary of poor technique is poor setup. Poor setup includes bad bars, angling the bars too far forward or backward, poor brake lever position, improper suspension setup and insufficent cockpit length.

I'd ditch that 31.8 bar you have on there, as it is probally a major thing that contributes to your hand pain. Handlebars need to flex to absorb high-frequency vibration. I also can't tell what brand of bars those are, but I've found that people who are sensitive to hand pain or armpump shouldn't run certain brands of bars as they have poor geometry that tends to put the wrist and hand out of alignment. Those same brands of bars often tend to be overly stiff as well. I also notice that you run padded gloves. Ditch those for something that has no padding, and I think that will help. Combining a stiff bar with heavily padded gloves and large diameter grips is going to be problematic for most people.

FWIW, i suffered a good deal of pump and hand pain in my first season of DH, and I ended up being able to isolate it as the crappy Titec bar i had on my bike, brakes that were rather poor (so I was on them more), and an underperforming fork.

 

[Kntr]

I agree..... I had arm and finger pain but went to a thinner palm glove and Rogues and now have no pain. I do run Razor rock levers though and those helped a lot too. It all comes down to what works for you. Try thin palmed gloves and smaller grips first. Try adjusting lever angle. Try some of the combos mentioned by everyone and find out what works for you. I have had had problems for years. I even had carpel tunnel surgery on both hands at only 24 yo. With the combo I run now, I have almost no pain, except for forearm pump. You just have to experiment and find out what works. Good Luck.

I also agree on bar choice. I got less hand pain when I ran carbon bars, then they broke and now I run Protapers. The 31.8 bars are a little stiffer and might also add to your hand pain.

There are so many different combos you could try. You'll figure it out. I would try a thinner palmed glove first, then a smaller grip, then a different bar, then different levers. Good luck

 

[jmvar]

Just to throw another variable in an equation that already has too many, do you guys think temperature has anything to do with finger pain?

When I road Diablo early in the season it was 75 degrees and I did not have the finger/joint pain I had in late october when it was 55 degrees.......It felt like I have arthoritis and I had finger pain up to 2 weeks later.

 

[flymybike]

Toshi
If you can deal without the lockons, I would try running the oldschool Oury grips. The plastic layer in the lockons reduce the amount of compliant material between your hands and the bar. The non locking grips have a far superior vibration damping feel and have the same large diameter that you seem to be looking for. I swore by them before lockons became available. I just like the conveniance of the lockers, I don't have the hand pain issue so no biggie for me. Back in the day I want as far as buying two sets of moto Ourys to get 1 set for my bike. (moto grips have a large one for throttle and a normal one for the other side) Nothing will be softer feeling than that.
2c

 

[flymybike]

maybe a Titanium bar would help too. Or steel if money is a concern.
Vibration damping through proper material selection.

 

[Toshi]

wow, lots of new info last night.

if oury grips (and ti/carbon/non-31.8 bars) are good because they damp vibrations, why are padded gloves bad? wouldn't they do the same? i do size my gloves so that they don't squirm around, as i find that extremely annoying...

Kanter recommends Rogues, flymybike old-school Ourys, and yet other people swear by Intense lock-ons. then we have the crew saying to go smaller. just for clarification, is anyone recommending smaller grips for finger pain? (as opposed to smaller grips for arm pump.)

 

[flymybike]

Smaller or bigger? You need to find just the right size. If your doc is telling you bigger, do it. Grips are 10 bucks, try one and if it doesn't work get something else, not much lost and alot of knowledge gained. I say the old Ourys because they are the most squishy grip I've tried. Ti bars to soften the blow and it just might be enough to get you through the day.

 

[Toshi]

Smaller or bigger? You need to find just the right size. If your doc is telling you bigger, do it. Grips are 10 bucks, try one and if it doesn't work get something else, not much lost and alot of knowledge gained. I say the old Ourys because they are the most squishy grip I've tried. Ti bars to soften the blow and it just might be enough to get you through the day.

fair enough, all of this "soften the blow" talk makes sense. except for the no-padding gloves. what's the rationale behind that, SuspectDevice?

 

[dump]

ya - get of the message boards & experiment a bit. all this talk doesn't mean much imo.

 

[Toshi]

ya - get of the message boards & experiment a bit. all this talk doesn't mean much imo.

shhhh . i don't plan on riding the big bike until the spring for unrelated reasons, so this discussion must remain theoretical until then.

 

[SuspectDevice]

fair enough, all of this "soften the blow" talk makes sense. except for the no-padding gloves. what's the rationale behind that, SuspectDevice?

I'll try to dig up a link to a study on this from MSSSE, as i seem to remember that you are an MD in training, right? But, basically adding padding to a glove increases, not devcreases the amount of shock transfered. Padding also makes you work harder to hold onto the bars because it is basically damping the contractile forces created by your hand muscles.

This is way all those wacky "shock absorbing" shoes on the market (like the ones stuffed with air, and the ones with coil springs etc...) are so ****ty the manner in which the disperse the impact forces is far, far from optimal... And the look dumb.

 

[Jeremy R]

I'll try to dig up a link to a study on this from MSSSE, as i seem to remember that you are an MD in training, right? But, basically adding padding to a glove increases, not devcreases the amount of shock transfered. Padding also makes you work harder to hold onto the bars because it is basically damping the contractile forces created by your hand muscles.

This is way all those wacky "shock absorbing" shoes on the market (like the ones stuffed with air, and the ones with coil springs etc...) are so ****ty the manner in which the disperse the impact forces is far, far from optimal... And the look dumb.

Yeah, I don't know the technical ins and outs, but I had my best year this year with armpump ever. I was using the Intense Lock-ons, a FSA carbon DH bar, and a pair of 661 Nasty gloves which have that super thin palm.
But come to think of it, I also used a pair of moto gloves as well this year, and they were too.
If your setup is right, I think the most important thing is still overall fitness, and to be honest, just doing DH runs helps more than anything.
Combine that with relaxing your hands while on the bar, and it should make it more bearable.

 

[ohio]

I didn't read this whole thing, but I at times get both the arm pump and the knuckle pain. The arm pump can be reduced by going to smaller diameter grips, and dialing the brake lever in closer... or just easing off the damn brakes.

The smaller diameter grips actually made the knuckle pain worse, however the real culprit is the fork. I NEVER had knuckle pain with my DH3... I get it pretty badly from the POS boxxer race I'm currently running. A well-tuned fork with good sensitivity will do WONDERS for both brake pump and knuckle pain.

 

[GravityFreakTJ]

the real culprit is the fork. I NEVER had knuckle pain with my DH3... I get it pretty badly from the POS boxxer race I'm currently running. A well-tuned fork with good sensitivity will do WONDERS for both brake pump and knuckle pain.

Odd,I had the knuckle pain with the SuperT but not with my Boxxer WC

 

[J5ive]

I started used the ns lizardskin grips. At first I hated them- thought they were too fat. Seem to be working for me now with no arm pump. Not that it was prevously a huge problem.

 

[Acadian]

well I didn't feel like starting a new thread all over again about grips...so I'm bringing this one back to life

For you Ruffian users:
My shop got a few Ruffian MX's yesterday and I was checking them out. They feelt pretty good, but I got the impression they were bigger (diameter)? Was going to give them a try but I got 2 problems with thicker grips
1) some of them give me arm pump (I got small hands)
2) some will give me blisters.

Anyone got some time on them?

 

[CBJ]

I used to get a bit of arm pump. Things that seem to have cleared it up for me:

-Get my brake levers angled correctly. (Obviously that's different for everyone, depending on height, riding position, etc. For me I had to angle them up a little more than usual.)
-brakign with only one finger
-keeping my levers adjusted close to the bar.
-Consciously braking less and keeping my grip on the bars from getting too tight.

I have done the exact same thing and that paired with thinner grips (I have small hands) and correct setup front shock has made a world of a difference - no more arm pump.

 

[Toshi]

fwiw, to answer my original question i measured rogues and lock-on ourys to be the same diameter.

 

[SuspectDevice]

Ruffian MX's are the same diameter as normal Ruffians. excluding the waffling, which You rotate to the bottom for more finger grip....

 

[Red Bull]

Hey suspect, i didnt know you were on here too...

I will call you tonight to try and work something out...

 

[Acadian]

Ruffian MX's are the same diameter as normal Ruffians. excluding the waffling, which You rotate to the bottom for more finger grip....

could of sworn they felt bigger...

 

[JRogers]

could of sworn they felt bigger...

Never used them, but they look to be the same size of regular Ruffians. Look like Intense ODIs with that waffle pattern.

 

[CSkolnick]

Forearm/finger/wrist pain (they are all inter-related) has been something that has been of great interest to me since i started hitting the mountain 2 seasons ago. i have PUNY wrists and girly little fingers and love a sport that puts a great deal of stress on these body parts. I have had on and off problems with carpal tunnel, got the worst case of tendonitis in my forearms from digging (couldnt even hold a pencil), and had severe finger pain like you mentioned after my first season of DH. Since these issues came up, ive been pretty adamant about reducing the recurrence of these problems. here are soem things ive found:

-grip size. honestly, personal preference and i think it has the least to do with pain experienced in DH. Get whatever grip you can comfortably get your hand around. Softer bigger grips dampen more vibration but give less "feel" from the terrain while thinner grips do the opposite. I loved Oury's when dirt jumping this summer with no gloves but switched to ruffians when it got cold and i needed gloves.

-hand position. scott mentioned a MX source talked about keeping the hand and wrist at the same angle; i could not agree more. You truly dont want a "death grip" on your bars. sure, sometimes there is no way around it but generally id say that is a good sign of improper technique/ergonimics. a death grip WILL kill your fingers. period.

The best thing ive found is to adapt what i learned dirt jumping to DH: curl your hands forward when riding aggresively. Dont use your hands for control, use your forearms. get a "firm" grip on the bars and roll forward (like a throttle)this will give you an elbow out stance. By doing this you are basically pulling the bike against you and calling out to other, more efficent muscles for bike control: forearm, bicep, chest and quads. additionally, riding elbows out keeps your wrist/forearm aligned like Scott mentioned.

If your wrists are bent at a weird angle, it puts pressure on every blood vessel, tendon and nerve going into your hand and consequently, your fingers! Now, whenever i ride aggressivly, i tape up my wrists to give them support and keep them in line with my hands and it works wonders. Some people dont need this if there wrist area is strong enough but i do and find it makes all the difference in the world.

The hardest thing about this rding positon is getting used to it. You have to an "active" rider on your bike; your not just along for the ride. if after a ride my foreams, biceps, quads and to a degree my chest feel fatigued, i know i was in proper form most of the time. However, if my wrists, shoulder and back are giving me pain, i know i wasnt riding "actively" and im going tom pay for it!. all sports and things physical are really just muscle memory (so when you feel exhausted after and cant keep proper form, STOP RIDING, let your muscles remember the right way to ride) so in time, it becomes second nature.....just like ridng a bike -

 

[punkassean]

Ruffian MX's rock Luc, I bought a set last summer at Whistler when I was having massive hand cramping issues and they helped a lot. I have used the std ruffians also for years. The MX's feel more like the intense's minus the flanges.

 

[BigStonz]

My 2 cents:
Studies have shown that isometric contractions like death gripping a handlebar fatigue muscles very quickly. Also, sustained pressure on a specific joint surface will create inflammation and pain very quickly. DH biking creates both these situations. The diameter of the grip may be a small contributing facter, but I don't believe it's the major issue.
I would offer that proper suspension set up and a shock absorbing grip like the Oury would help. However, the most important thing is to vary the pressure on the joints and vary the contraction of the muscles. How? On stretches of trail where a death grip is not required open and close your hands slightly on the grips, or ride with looser grip.
While I am not a hand specialist, I am a physical therapist.

PS- If I can ever help fellow riders by responding to injury/rehab questions feel free to email

 

[Acadian]

Ruffian MX's rock Luc, I bought a set last summer at Whistler when I was having massive hand cramping issues and they helped a lot. I have used the std ruffians also for years. The MX's feel more like the intense's minus the flanges.

I think I'm just going to stick with the regular Ruffian's - the MX felt kindda chunky and I've never had any problems with my regular ones.

 

[ZEDMAN]

i have rogues on both of my bikes. they work great in my opinion. i still get arm pump on longer descents and after a full day of northstar my hands if relaxed kinda close themselves. moving my levers helped but the pump is still there just less of it

 

[-dustin]

i don't know if i have big hands or not (i can palm a basketball...big?) and i looooove the way the Ruffians feel. i've been wanting to try some of those Ruffian MXs. Acadian, did they feel Oury-fat, or just a little bigger?

 

[Acadian]

i don't know if i have big hands or not (i can palm a basketball...big?) and i looooove the way the Ruffians feel. i've been wanting to try some of those Ruffian MXs. Acadian, did they feel Oury-fat, or just a little bigger?

just a bit bigger - but nowhere near as fat as the oury's

 

[Spunger]

In my BMX days I had thick oury style grips and it bugged my hands so much. I went to the ATI pistol grip (looks like a BMX ODI grip) and it was my grip of choice. Granted there were no lock on's or anything so it was super thin to begin with.

I had Intense lock on's and didn't like the feel of them. I switched to the ruffian lock on's and liked them much better. My fingers/hands stopped hurting. Also not grabbing the bars so hard on sketchy stuff helped a ton as well. I was always so tensed when riding I'd be sore just from tensing up. I started to relax a little more and the problems went away.

Lock on's are thicker anyways due to their lock on device. If it came down to it you could switch to a BMX style grip and slide them on with an air compressor (so you don't lube them or anything) and see if a thinner but more grippy grip helps? The ruffian MX look nice but look better I think on a MX bike. I imagine they help though. Hell everyone's hands different here.

Mysetup is stock hayes levers & ruffian grips. When I find a set of GRC/Dangerboy lever's I'll go that route and see how I like them. The only grips that bugged my arms were the Intense ones.

 

[Kalbi777]

i fight with this problem every time i go riding. after 3-4 fast aggressive descends my fingers are in huge pain. and i can barely take off my hands od the grips and opening the hand hurts like nothing.
i tried very small and thick grips. but this didn't helped. A lot of people told me to relax on the handlebar and not to hold the bar so tight but, the problem is when you are braking and braking strong you need to hold the bar strong. It's not possible to hold the bar lightly until strong braking. I think my problem comes from not enough braking power. if i wouldn't need so much strong to trigger the lever i'm sure i would have less pain.
I currently have zee's but these aren't nearly enough powerful for my hand pain.

 

[Westy]

How the hell does a necro-bump from 2014 show up on the top of the list?


I don't have the time to go through every pedantic post but I am rather disappointed in the lack of masturbatory exercise jokes.