Here’s a little secret I never tell non-cyclists: At times, the bike can be both the poison and the cure. I want to explore this, in part, because I and several people I know are suffering with a variety of injuries, ranging from tendinitis, flat-pedal-inflicted puncture wounds and, in my case, lower back issues.
In my case, the bike is definitely both the poison and the cure. I didn’t get a lot of riding in during May, June and July due to my mother’s death, something I always knew was going to suck, but has turned out to be far worse than I could ever have imagined. That’s not what I’m here to discuss, though.
One Saturday several weeks ago, following my return to Seattle to work as a fitter for Bike Works, I made an early jaunt to Tiger Mountain prior to spending the rest of the day at the shop.
Call it what you want, zero to hero, off the couch, whatever, I rode pretty hard. I took the long climb as easy as I could, but there’s a trail near the top, Powerlink, that has a bunch of steep stair-step sections and I powered through them. And because I was under time pressure, I wasted no time at the top and ripped the descent, got to my car and the moment my bike was loaded up I hopped in and drove to Bike Works. It’s worth mentioning I was just coming off being sick, too. The combination of hard bike ride after not having been on the bike much along with being on my feet for hours several days in a row set the stage for what happened the following Monday.
Which is to say, I leaned over to open the trunk of my car and my back went out. My lumbar went into spasm and two days later when I flew home my back was so bad I barely made it through the airport.
Since then, I’ve been on my back most days, eating muscle relaxers, lying on a heating pad and generally being miserable. It was only two days ago that I was able to move well enough to get on my ebike and go run some errands that way. Gentle riding helps more than anything else I can do. I’ve been here before, but the last time was 21 years ago.
There are several dimensions of riding a bike that can be helpful—even when it has been the source of the injury. First, there is the way it eliminates impact and the jarring effects of footfalls that come with hiking and walking. It also isolates range of motion to a portion of the legs’ total range of movement in a way that reduces strain on most joints and the back. And thanks to gears, it is possible to reduce your effort to something manageable if an aspect of the injury forces a reduction in effort.
The trick, of course, is knowing when it’s okay to get back on the bike, being able to accurately gauge whether or not pedaling will perpetuate your trouble or aid your recovery. And believe me, there have been plenty of times, such as with knee tendinitis back in the early ‘90s, when I got back on the bike too quickly and found myself with the same problem all over again.
In talking with occupational and physical therapists over the years, they have validated my belief that the bike can definitely aid recovery, but that you have to have the humility to dial back both intensity and duration, and if necessary due to the nature of the injury—such as my lower back muscle spasms—it’s important to find a way to sit more upright. This is part of what makes my ebike ideal. It has a mustache bar that sits a bit higher than my saddle; there’s no bike I own where I sit more upright than with my ebike.
None of this knowledge helps me to square my predicament with the reality that the bike contributed to it. There’s a six year old in me screaming, “La-la-la, I can’t hear you.” There’s also a grownup in me who isn’t pulling the bib shorts on.
Image: Catherine Wella