Just hoping to get any thoughts and experiences from people on my current predicament.
Fist of all, some years ago now, I was diagnosed as having osteoarthritis in the hips, particularly the left. I get some impingement pain in the left but only rarely and have a reasonable range of movement in the hip. Recently (a year ago) I was diagnosed with some minor arthritis in the thumb joints (pain in both sides became apparent at the same time), not a major issue yet but it's there. In the last month or two I started getting constant pain in my right hip on the outer side (not groin). It's apparent when I ride and even worse when sitting for long periods when I do notice it more also in my lower back. My physio, who I have known for years and have a fair bit of faith in, believes the issue is a lumbar spine issue. Has anyone else had experience with something like this?
So far I am doing a number of stretches for hip flexors and glutes as well as starting on some core exercises as I am very weak in this way. I don't want to stop riding altogether but will probably cut down for a while.
My physio looked at my bike set-up an thinks my road/touring bike is set up 50mm too long in terms of reach! After looking at my MTB I have shortened the stem by 20mm to get it roughly in line with what he has said. The road touring bike (which has a 100mm stem) might need an 80mm and I might need to look at 65mm reach bars in place of my current 90mm ones. Not sure what that would do to the bike.... Of course I could always get a new one
. That said, I did ride the road/touring bike for years including cycle touring in Europe and didn't feel like I had problems then. I guess it's all catching up with me now...Anyway, that's probably enough to start with. It would be great to get any thoughts, experiences from anyone who has had similar issues.
