loriy29680

A couple of thoughts on the knee pain... have you checked the float on your pedals? I have speedplays and that is why I bought them... alot of float, cause I've had knee injuries in the past and didn't want the knee pain.

Also, have you checked your seat height? I was having some knee pain after mile 20 or 25 on my rides and it was getting worse and worse. Turns out my seat was a tad too low and putting too much pressure on my knees.
I need to have a professional fitting done, but have been just making minor adjustments as needed along the way instead.

Just a couple thoughts. Hope the bike is ok, and glad to hear you got home alright. Hopefully next time someone will be nice enough to ask you if you need any help, but it sounds like your experience has guaranteed at a minimum that you'll start asking others. Hate you had to go through that, but some good came from it.

ultra-g

Did you bother asking for Help? Or are you just mad at the world that no one "Offered" to help?

timmhaan

oh yeah...i've been checking\adjusting seat height, saddle postition for a while now. for over a year actually. i've had knee pain pretty much since i've started riding, and i think i messed it up during a century ride last month. i've never been able to ride more than 25 miles since then.

i have speedplay frog pedals with shimano mtb shoes. the last thing i adjusted before going out that day was the cleat position - i rotated it outward a little. i thought that might do the trick.

timmhaan

ultra-g, is this a necessary post? i didn't post crap like this after reading about your accident in another thread a few months ago. we both live in the same city and enjoy the same hobby - if you believe in karma, i may just see you on the side of the road someday. let's see - an asian guy, over 200 pounds, waving an MS office certificate, riding a langster or a fuji track. got it...i'll keep my eye's open.

slvoid

Oh come on guys, take it easy.
Yes, you did say no one OFFERED to help, not that you asked.
And yes, people probably should have stopped and asked if you needed help.
If I saw someone on the side of the road clutching their knee in pain, I'd stop to help. But if I saw someone on the side sitting on the grass looking like they were taking a break, I wouldn't stop. Maybe I'll even wave as I go by thinking he was just taking a break. Meanwhile, he probably would've thought I was making fun of him.

timmhaan

ah, slvoid - always the calm level-headed poster in a sea of turbulence. or something like that. anyway, point well taken. i'm probably overly cranky from having to get up for work at 5:30 this morning. Plus I can’t ride my bike, my gf is out of town….something has to give!

ch0mb0

sleep with the bike

timmhaan

i would as i love my bike very much, but what if there is an accident, and i get, um, "stuck" in the gears? how do i explain that to the paramedics?

slvoid

The 'other' lube.

ultra-g

Keep your eyes open then. If you're saying you want to start some sh*it with me because I hurt your feelings in a post then I'm fine with that. I'm in Central Park in the evenings 4-5 days a week doing loops, I don't go too fast either. I wear all black, usually Adidas. Plus I wear glasses, ask Slvoid, he knows what I look like.

I don't believe I had a chip on my shoulder when I was describing the accident I got into a few months ago. Plus all the people in Central Park were very helpful.

slvoid

All black.. at night... I guess it's a survival tactic. That drug lord you pissed off? Now you can ride into a dark alley, turn off your lights, and you'll be practically invisible.
Did that lady who got in your way stop to help you or was she smacking you cause you tried to cop a feel as you hit her? Wasn't she knocked out?

JoeLonghair

Sorry to hear about your bad day and to have a **** in the sub way to put the cherry on the cake must have been the last straw. Getting back to the thing that matters, the knee, whilst on my recent tour of Italy, I did my knee in when I had to do a 15 hr ride covering 100 miles with a pack, climbing for 5 1/2 hr to get back on track from the un intended detour. When I got back home, UK, I spoke to a friend, a trained medic in the Army, asking his advice. He said it was strange that my knee was injured as the cycling motion does not inflict any injury on the knee, what does though he added was the side ways motion of the knee whilst cycling however small . Well I stood there with my mouth open as I then explained to him that my seat was rubbing constantly against my thighs, so much so that I had to peel my cycling shorts off every night as the skin was raw and stuck to the shorts. Obviously when the body is in pain it automatically avoids the rubbing motion hence the sideways motion to avoid the thigh injury thus giving the knee injury, all in all a total pain in the ass.
Anyway his advice was to take for however long Glucoseamine, this will build the cartilage and the fluids in the knee restoring it to its full kickass pedal strokes.

The seat I changed as my bike shop man laughed when I told him about the thighs, he said the seat I had was only good for riding to the shops and nothing else.

Hope the knee sorts itself out keep us posted, hopefully you will be knocking a ton(100m) out.

slvoid

I had the same problem as that long haired dude. I've NEVER had knee pain on my bike till that day I did a 70 mile ride in boxers and a regular pair of shorts. My ass crack (sorry, lack of better description) started chaffing about 35 miles into it and I unconsciously compensated by shifting my right leg out sideways during every pedal stroke. That's when the pain started. It's all good now.

timmhaan

that's a good thought longhair. i wonder if i'm compensating somehow as the miles buildup. i don't feel that i am, but maybe it's just a really subtle thing. i'm hoping my visit to the doctor and the professional bike fitter i scheduled an appointment with in two weeks will be able to determine if my left leg is slightly different from my right leg. i'm thinking that may be part of the problem...because it's clear that what works for one does not work for the other. i've heard a lot of good things about Glucoseamine as well. i'll ask my doctor about it and see if it will help me.

slvoid - you've convinced me to try the knee brace. i'm going to duane reade on my lunch break to buy one. i think i saw some there at one point.

slvoid

My girlfriend swiped her dad's glucoseamine for me and they seemed to help my knee.
There's two types, there's the knee brace
and then there's the wrap
I've only used the wrap since it gives me a little more control of the tension but the brace seems a lot more convienent. You can also try wearing it while cycling on weekends, just short rides to get the blood flowing. Most of the pharmacies only have the wrap, some place like paragon sports or modells would have the braces.

zensuit

I thought about this guy's knee issues...and realized...he needs a new CF bike...

Why didn't I think of that before?

JoeLonghair

Another thought, whilst you are checking it out with the doc, its not uncommon for one leg to be slightly shorter, or longer than the other, the difference is very small, but riding perscion instrument and at a distance on a regular basis might have some repercussions.

Intresting to see what the proffesionals make of it. Keep us posted.

dragracer

I feel your pain man....no really I feel it. Tore a ligament playing highschool football years ago. I havn't been able to ride much since the middle of the summer because of my bad knee. I have an appointment to have it looked at in about a month. I'm hoping there is something left to salvage. I never know from one day to the next if it's gonna hurt or be ok. It can be fine one minute and then be popping/catching/hurting like hell the next minute. Been like that for a long time but as I get older it has gotten a lot worse and the painful days seem to be more abundant than the nonpainful days now. Hang in there and give the cyciling a rest for a while. If it's hurting that bad then it's telling you something is definately wrong with it.

timmhaan

yeah - the worst part about it isn't just the pain. it's the unpredictability of that pain, like you mention. i'm really nervous to take the stairs now, which just sucks because i have to deal with them everyday. i'm never sure at what angle it will flare up. it's like walking on eggs, i just have to be really careful. i feel like the oldest 27 year old in the world.

Paniolo

Tim, sorry to hear of your ordeal. I actually switched to biking hoping to take it easy on chronically bad knee. And it has felt better ... at least till a couple of weekends ago when I did an endo on the mtb and smacked it hard on a rock... or my bike or something hard. Over the next week/10 days I was a little worried as my 11 mile commute was causing pain but it's subsided.

My knee has rhehomitoid arthritis and is roughly 2x the size of the other, basically has no cartledge left due to the severe staff infection I got in the hospital getting it operated on and has bone spurs limiting it to a little over 90* of flexation. But for some reason I rarely have pain ?? the Doctors can't beleive it ... I've been told several times I have X steps left on it, they just don't know what x is I just hope it holds out till artifical knees improve enough to hold up to biking, skiing etc! So go see a doc, find out what you have to do, and get it taken care of.

Oh, I always ask if people need help too ... I am amazed at the rude responses I get sometimes, but once I went through all my patches and a spare tube about 11 miles from home and a girl saw me walking my bike and stopped and gave me her spare. So I try to give back.

Wishing you luck, good health and a fantastic ride very soon,