Sitting hunched over the handlebars can cause a little bit of aching – and working on your core strength – so you can better support yourself is a good long term goal. However, if you’re finding that neck or back pain is getting in the way of your enjoyment on the bike, there might be a bike fit fix that could relieve the tension.

Low back pain

It could be that you are overly stretched out on the bike – in which case you may be able to solve this by simply swapping your stem for a shorter one, or flipping it to give you a positive angle (raising the handlebars).

Alternatively, it could be that your hips are rocking, causing irritation to the pelvis – this is more often than not down to a saddle that is too high.

The final option is that your hips are rotated – something that happens a lot to cyclists when right muscles in one hip and thigh pull the pelvis out of alignment. In this case, a trip to a good physiotherapist or osteopath could help, and a bike fit might be the best option to address any discrepancy in leg length.

Neck and shoulder pain

Again, you could be placing too much pressure on your shoulders and neck by being too far stretched out, or having an overly large saddle-to-bar drop. You can resolve this by swapping your stem for a shorter one, placing it at a positive angle, or raising your handlebars by moving any spacers you have above the stem, below it. In other words – if you’ve “slammed your stem”, un-slam it.

Pain in your hands is likely to have a similar cause – again, try raising your handlebars.