Chronic Downhillers/Freeriders - Hands ON

When you guys ride Whistler and any other Resorts or rough trails, how long can you guys ride before you quit because of your hands hurting?

I have a problem - When riding resorts doing downhill, i must be gripping too tight and when i get down to the bottom, it hurts so fuckin bad to strech them out

- i almost have to ply my fingers off my bars. I believe i have a death grip going on, and the tendon/muscle memory keeps my hands tight as hell and hurts so bad by the 3 or 4 time down the mountain.

what should i do, (i have heard of using those hand squeeze things) but my forearms NEVER hurt its just my joints in my hand.

How do you get a loose / but firm grip going on? Because it sucks stopping after 4hrs of riding because my hands hurt so bad.

I would really apprceiate your help!

I've heard that some people adjust their brake lever position so that its higher on the bar and so they have to stretch out their hand more, not something I would be willing to do! Maybe loosen off your grip as you are riding, sounds simple but try to relax your whole upper body more and your riding should develop aswell as your hands hurting less. Just practise practise practise and your hands will get used to taking a beating aswell. I know this sucks but if you have to stop half way down a run and stretch ur hands then do it so you can ride the whole day. Hope it sorts itself out man, ride on.

i had the exact same problem up Whistler last year. I adjust my brake levers like big_air_smite said so my hands were more in a natural posistion and i didnt have to pull as hard or reach as far for my brake lever

my levers are close as it is, they really are not that far away.

it has to do with my gripping on the bars, the rapid vibrations from riding just shake the fuck out of my hand joints and my tendons get in a death grip memory and they just ache so bad like 10x arthritius (sp?)

I am curious how tight people are holdin on, can people last all day and hands dont hurt? I really want to know this more than anything becuase it suck only riding down the mtn 5 times because the last 2 times you had to stop and rest becuase your hand/joint in hand hurt so bad..

Adjusting the reach on your levers is good.
I also bought a Gripmaster and keep it in my truck. I drive 30 minutes each way to work and back so I use it all the time. I never get arm pump.

HAHA River_Rat beat me to it while I was posting

i got that a long time ago in whistler, but i just kept going………….i did whistler 4 days straight one time and it only hurt a little on the 4th day,so u just have to try and loosen ur grip, and move ur leavers a bit

Try that grip master thing, or adjust your lever so that you have to reach more, this means that you have to streach your hand out more to reach the lever, stopping the muscle memory from developing. I suppose that is a little dangerous but once youve given that a go try moving the lever back and see if you are still getting the same problems?

If you already get "the grip" you will probably always get it. I get it only at Whistler and Sun Peaks. It goes with the territory: high speed and lots of chatter. I don't think it has anything to do the grip, as I have tried everything.

You might also want to try different combinations of gloves. Sometimes, the gloves have so much padding that they are forcing the diameter of the grip to be wider. This will cause fatigue more quickly in your hand/wrist.
Windsurfing had the same sort of problems and the industry standard now is to have skinnier booms made from tougher material (carbon fibre). The smaller the diameter of the object you are holding, the easier it is on your muscles/joint. Try gripping a pen. Then have someone try and pull it forwards from both ends of the pen. You will find that your grip is nearly unbeatable. Now try and grip a water bottle. Have someone try to pull it forwards out of your hand. It is much harder to sustain your grip pressure and requires much more work, thus you would get sore/tired much more quickly.
Keeping that in mind, if I were you, I would find the lowest profile grips (i.e. they aren't fat and padded), a set of gloves with less overall padding in the palms, adjust your levers so they are the most comfortable and use the palm exerciser.
You may also want to adjust your fork to deaden some of the high speed chatter that it seems that you are getting.

IMPORTANT: If you are already feeling a lot of pain in your wrist and hand, you may have damaged the tendons/ligaments. You actually have an injury, just not an obvious one like a sprained ankle or something. This means that you should rest for a while, maybe even a week or two to mend. If you just ignore the problem and try to 'tough it out', you may actually ruin your whole season and the pain will not go away. You could even do some serious damage. Joint pain almost always = injury. Use the RICE, (Rest Ice Compression and Elevation), method for a week or so and then build slowly. Do plenty of wrist/hand stretches and exercises.

Just my 2 cents.
Good luck.:)

Originally posted by Slamigo
**You might also want to try different combinations of gloves. Sometimes, the gloves have so much padding that they are forcing the diameter of the grip to be wider. This will cause fatigue more quickly in your hand/wrist.
Windsurfing had the same sort of problems and the industry standard now is to have skinnier booms made from tougher material (carbon fibre). The smaller the diameter of the object you are holding, the easier it is on your muscles/joint. Try gripping a pen. Then have someone try and pull it forwards from both ends of the pen. You will find that your grip is nearly unbeatable. Now try and grip a water bottle. Have someone try to pull it forwards out of your hand. It is much harder to sustain your grip pressure and requires much more work, thus you would get sore/tired much more quickly.
Keeping that in mind, if I were you, I would find the lowest profile grips (i.e. they aren't fat and padded), a set of gloves with less overall padding in the palms, adjust your levers so they are the most comfortable and use the palm exerciser.
You may also want to adjust your fork to deaden some of the high speed chatter that it seems that you are getting.

IMPORTANT: If you are already feeling a lot of pain in your wrist and hand, you may have damaged the tendons/ligaments. You actually have an injury, just not an obvious one like a sprained ankle or something. This means that you should rest for a while, maybe even a week or two to mend. If you just ignore the problem and try to 'tough it out', you may actually ruin your whole season and the pain will not go away. You could even do some serious damage. Joint pain almost always = injury. Use the RICE, (Rest Ice Compression and Elevation), method for a week or so and then build slowly. Do plenty of wrist/hand stretches and exercises.

Just my 2 cents.
Good luck.:) **

Very good advice, you owned me! :cuffs:

Slam: I think I have the opposite problem. I have extremely large hands with long fingers, and I have to grip a bar differently from many other people to prevent my fingers from overlapping on my palm. I also have a death-grip on them. I get huge cramping at Whistler, and blisters at the joint of my fingers to my palm almost all the time.

I get this using free-weights too…the same diameter bar, the same problem. This season I'm working on getting some fatter grips, and gloves with heavier padding in them. I'm hoping this will let my hands have better gripping technique so I won't need to death-grip all the time.

So Rat, either make your grips fatter or skinnier, and your gloves more or less padded. ;) :P

Originally posted by Gandalf
. I have extremely large hands with long fingers, and I have to grip a bar differently from many other people to prevent my fingers from overlapping on my palm.

Quit showing off!:D

Originally posted by blunt boy
Quit showing off!:D

Showing off would be saying that I need hands that size to fit around my ginormous c*ck.

and i do.
:lol: