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Consistent pedaling means your legs definitely get a work out on the bike, which makes it easy to forget about your arms, hands, and wrists. They’re just propping you up, right? While true, keeping yourself upright requires work. And when your wrists bear the brunt of hours in the saddle, it can sometimes lead to nagging wrist pain.
What’s more, the wrong body position or the wrong bike fit can also lead to wrist pain when cycling—and even cause nerve damage if you keep ignoring it.
To stay comfortable through every ride, here’s what to know about keeping wrist pain at bay, including prevention and treatment.
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How to Prevent Wrist Pain While Cycling
Check your wrist position
Just as posture on the bike is important, wrist position also matters while riding. People tend to assume their wrists should be straight, like in a karate chop. “That’s actually a compressive position for the wrists,” explains physical therapist and bike fit specialist Kevin Schmidt, owner of Pedal PT in Portland, Oregon. It puts extra pressure on the nerves and tendons in the carpal tunnel, a narrow passageway that runs from the wrist to the hand. This pressure can then lead to wrist pain.
“You actually want 15 to 20 degrees of backbend in the wrist, which will open up that carpal tunnel,” Schmidt says. If you go far enough back that you can see a crease in your skin, that’s too far and will end up compressing the carpal tunnel again.
Dial in your bike fit
It’s not just how you hold your wrist that matters on the bike. One of the most common culprits of wrist pain when cycling is also an out-of-sync weight distribution. “If your position on the bike shifts your weight distribution to be more prominently on the wrists and hands than the saddle, that’s likely to cause a problem,” says Jason Williams, a human performance sports scientist and bike fit specialist with Retül in Boulder, Colorado.
A few key points in bike fit will help with that weight distribution:
1. Check your saddle position
One of the biggest culprits behind messed-up weight distribution? Your saddle. “If the saddle is too high or the nose is pointed too far down, that ends up dumping a ton of weight into your hands,” says Schmidt.
Obviously, the exact measurements are going to depend on your body and what saddle you’re using, but, in general, if your saddle is angled down by more than 5 or 6 degrees, it may lead to wrist pain, says Williams.
2. Look to your handlebars
Reaching too far for the handlebars will also put excess pressure on your wrists and can cause wrist pain. “Typically, if you’re looking at the shoulder compared to the trunk, you want a 90-degree angle at the shoulder itself,” says Schmidt. Beyond that, you’re going to end up locking out your elbow and put a lot of backward bending in the wrist, he adds.
Speaking of handlebars, “if your hand placement or hoods are significantly wider than your shoulders, you tend to roll the wrist outward,” says Williams, so you’re putting the weight of your hands on the meaty part of your palm. “That’s right where the ulnar nerve passes through,” explains Schmidt, “so that would give you a tingling and numbness in your pinky and ring finger.” And if you have to roll your hands significantly forward to grip the brakes and shifters, that can cause pain, too, he adds.
While you can rotate the brake levers a bit, there’s not much room to adjust the handlebars. “Some of this can be remedied with a little bit of change to your technique and posture, but you may just need a new handlebar if yours aren’t promoting that natural alignment and are causing pain,” says Williams.
3. See a professional
One of the best ways to avoid all of this is getting your bike fit to your body right at the outset. “For some riders, it really makes sense to just go into a fitter that they trust and get their bike fit figured out, lock in their position, and then go shopping based on that fit,” says Williams. “Other riders prefer to find a bike that they like and buy it, then get it fit retroactively.”
Getting your bike properly fit allows you to ride as long and far as you want without any pain points—even ones that seem as minor as wrist pain.
Other Ways to Avoid Wrist Pain While Cycling
Things like terrain—rough roads and rocky gravel—can put extra stress on your wrists with all the chatter and bumping up and down and lead to wrist pain. In those conditions, you want to avoid tire pressure that’s too high, says Schmidt. “Running tubeless tires at 20 pounds or 15 pounds can create more shock absorption,” he says.
Other solutions, like carbon fiber handlebars that better absorb that high-frequency vibration or even gel handlebar wraps can help soften the bounce a bit, adds Williams.
Keep in mind, proper bike fit can help with these issues too.
How to Identify the Cause of Wrist Pain While Cycling
If you’re already on a bike and dealing with wrist pain, start paying attention to the circumstances. “If symptoms occur super quick, a larger modification—like fixing the saddle position—probably needs to be made. If your wrist starts hurting five hours in, that may just be about correcting your hand position,” says Schmidt.
Cyclists, like many athletes, can be somewhat masochistic when it comes to pain during workouts, but you don’t want to push through any sharp, localized pain. “Muscle soreness and fatigue and the strain of putting in a hard effort is all very appropriate, but pain is not part of the puzzle,” says Williams. “Localized or asymmetric joint pain is a real strong indicator that your position is off or your parts are off, and you should see a professional to sort that out, because it can cause some real trouble long-term.”
