Hello To All,

This is my first post here on the Fixed Gear section Of Bike Forums
(But have been reading posts for over 2 months)
and am not quite sure if this is where this question belongs but i ride a fixed gear bike
so it seemed appropriate
The question Goes as follows:

(Due to my Bike Being my main Means of transportation)
I ride an average of 25+ miles a day
To and from work and
from point A to B sometimes C (depending on my knee)
but lately after riding for any length of time
my hands get this "Pins & Needles" feeling almost numbing sensation
which at first didnt bother me Too Much but this past 2 weeks the "Pins & Needles"
feeling has lasted for up to a few Hours after my ride was over
I was wondering if anyone Here has had this problem or knew of anyone that Did/Does
and how they went about correcting the situation and if its something i should be overly concerned with ?
Thank You All and Thank you for all the Informative Matireal that is posted here
::Some basic info if needed:::
I'm 5'8 and weigh 205 lbs
My handle Bars are a set of Mtb
Straight Bars that have been cut down to
8 inches in length and have Soft Bmx Grips on them
i Have been using this set up for about 2 months Now
and the problem was there when i had regualr (road bike)
drop bars as well:::

Holy Crap this got long...sorry

When I have customers with these problems I firs try to adjust the handlebars angle. In next step I'll sell them a pair of bicycle gloves. It will give me money and a satisfied customer
/Martin

Wear gloves if you aren't already, make sure they're fitted properly. That'll give you extra padding.
Sounds like circulation trouble, Pins and Needles like when your leg falls asleep? If you're using straight bars are they adjusted so that your arms are bent at the elbow to support your upper body and steer? If your arms are straight it's can be easy to rely on them to carry all the weight when your back and abs should be pulling their own throughout the ride. If your arms are straight you've likely got all your upper body weight on them and in turn on your wrists and palms which if held for an extended ride will become very uncomfortable and can eventually damage your wrists.

It sounds like nerve pressure -- perhaps you can adjust your bar or saddle a bit (tilt, slide forward, backward) to alleviate the pressure points between your hands and bar. I developed a similiar problem several months ago, and it was caused by my old worn out saddle gradually tilting forward a bit. After a few months it had tilted a couple centimeters forward, and that caused the same symptoms you described. After I levelled seat back to it's proper angle, the problem ceased.

if it is just the hands, it may be a bar height/stem length issue coming to the surface. since every one's physical compostion is unique, so will the body's reactions to a bike set-up. personally, I have never had the same break-in time/settling-in experience as anyone else. Similar? Yes, but not identical.
It may also be all the squishiness of the grips pinching nerves in your hands. I have had similar experiences when I stopped wearing padding cycling gloves/changed bat tape thinkness.
Try a few small variations on your current set-up and see what the effect is on the problem you are experiencing. no one can truly and fully dial-in a bike but the owner. and learning a little bit how to do it yourself will help you to get it where you want it. make sense?
and welcome to the FG/SS forums...

Couple of thoughts from your comments.

1. It seems to be getting worse, so you'll want to deal with it.
2. It's unlikely to be circulatory. Circulation (vascular) problems come on quickly and leave quickly once the pressure is gone. Having something for a couple of hours is more likely nerve compression (which actually is a circulatory problem, but that's more detail than we need).
3. You didn't say where in your hand you feel the tingling, try to be aware of its in your palm, your fingers (and which ones). This will be helpful to try to narrow down the likely spot of compression if you need to see someone about it.
4. Generally numb hands are caused by compression on the nerve that runs down the middle of your wrist (median nerve), typically as it goes through a small tunnel in your wrist called the carpal tunnel. Lots of other stuff runs through this tunnel, including the ligaments of various muscles. A little bit of swelling here or compression can give you the hand symptoms. Many of the solutions people are posting deal with shifting your body such that less weight his put on your hands. White knuckle riding can also increase the pressure. Be aware of how tightly you grip the bars.
5. I'd suggest doing a few things: If it persists consult a chiropractor, MD or PT with sports medicine experience.
4. Stretching your forearms out from time to time and work out any knots you may find in the muscles can sometimes help a bit. https://www.nqi.ca/chww/downloads/200...ms%20final.pdf
5. Play around with your seat, handlebar height and position to see if it helps as per the suggestions others have posted.
6. You could try changing your hand position from time to time or riding hands free for a bit to give yourself a break. I do this even on short rides.

Hope that helps a bit. The preceding is intended for information only and does not represent a diagnosis or recommendation for care.

yep...

Thank you all for the information you were able to provide me with
i went around the Block real quick and realized i WAS leaning all my weight
on my hands so im going to correct the bar height and slide the seat foward
a bit and then go for a longer ride with
my elbows slightly bent and tools in bag and make adjustments
until i get it just right .....Thanks Again

On a lighter note i just won an auction on a 55cm Bianchi Pista Track frame for $182.50
(anyone here think i got a deal or did my adrenaline force me to pay too much....either way i own it now and cant wait its arrival)
now all i need is a fork and im set to go

The nerves to the hand and fingers run from the head through the neck, and then through the shoulders, elbows, wrists and palm.
The cause of the tingling can come from any of those places, but usually from the neck.
Sometimes people will get a taller stem or riser bars in order to put themselves in a more erect position, thinking they have addressed the tingling by taking weight off of their hands; when, in reality, they have straightened out their neck so that they don't pinch the nerves in their neck which go to and from their hands.

Impingement at the neck doesn't typically cause isolated hand numbness. If compressed in the neck, the nerve is affected at the spinal root or at the cords/branches in the brachial plexus (eg. thoracic outlet syndrome), distal compression typically involves motor signs and/or dysesthesias in a dermatomal pattern of the root affected or in the distribution of the peripheral nerve supplied if it's compressed more distally. Impingement in the neck or at the thoracic outlet would be much more likely to show more widespread sensory changes than isolated hand numbness. The median nerve, the nerve supplying most of the cutaneous sensory innervation to the hand given that it's susceptible to compression at the wrist/hand and is a far more likely explanation for hand numbness than compression in the neck.

No nerves run from the head to innervate the upper extremity. Nerves from the head are more usually called cranial nerves, and have a variety of function of innervation including innervation of the face and anterior scalp.

Typically if you rest most of your weight in your hands means your saddle is too far forward for the reach of the bars. If your saddle setback is adjusted properly, your torso should be in balance when your legs are pushing the pedals. You should be able to take your hands off the bars without straining to hold your torso up. If you move the bars up and sit more upright, you will not be making full use of your glutes and put more strain on your lower back.

Try adjusting your saddle back and slightly lower, figure out how far over you can lean comfortably then get a stem length to match. You'll get a more aerodynamic position and make best use of your body's most powerful muscles.

People with injuries to or impingement on the nerves as they proceed from the spine will sometimes have symptoms in the hands with no symptoms between the impingement site and the hand symptom.
For example, a person might have numb or tingling thumbs, thumb and index finger, fingers, and etc., without any symptoms in the neck, shoulder, upper arm or lower arm.
Nonetheless, the symptoms have their root cause in the neck and not in the hands.
My point?
Play with position on the bike with a mind to how it effects the neck.
Yes, the symptoms could come from too much weight on the hands.