Nowadays cycling is one of the best and ordinary exercises to increase efficiency along with improving your overall muscular and physical strength and practice your willpower. You may find it funny and enjoyable especially on a lonely stretch of a road. But it obviously has some certain risks or side effects. This section provides descriptions of 25 common problems while biking, and after having learned this information, you won’t have to endure the same problems!
- Heat Problem
If you ride in the high heat, you need to do more to stay safe. When outside temperatures above 95 degrees, you will face some potential health risks as joggers and walker. It is recommended that cyclists should stay indoors between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. in which the sun's rays are at their worst. If possible exercise in the early morning or evening. After cycling, do not look for the air conditioning immediately unless your body cools down very gradually.
- Dehydration
When you are out in 100-degree weather you will lose 1 liter of sweat per hour. Water should be carried up to three liters if you ride for longer roads in hotter days. For its portability, bottle holder is available to attach water to bicycle. Insulated bottles also are suggested in hot days to keep water cooler. Drink plenty of water or other fluids before, during and after you cycling. It is not proper to wait until you are thirsty. If you are dehydrated, stay indoors for at least seven days and avoid hot showers. Avoid alcohol and caffeine. If symptoms worsen, call a doctor for help.
- Slow Breath
Cycling also can cause a person breathing slowly and takes more time to take a breath whether with exertion or at rest. So when it is hard to breathe, don’t stay alone to prevent any emergency. Learning to adjust breath is very important.
- Osteopenia
It is a problem if you're light and sweated a lot. The only thing to do is to take some time off cycling and do a lot of hiking and weight lifting as well as taking calcium supplements.
- Clothing
Do you have some special shirts for riding? It is better to have some. Because they wick moisture away from the skin and keep riders cool, as well as separate moisture and heat against the skin. If this sort of clothing isn't available, wear light-colored which isn’t of absorption of heat and reflects the sunlight, loose clothing that leave some room for keeping air in circulation across the skin.
- Helmets
A large number of people don't aware of wearing bicycle helmets during hotter days because they think it too hot to hold. In fact, it is contrary. Considering safety features, helmets are conducive to air into the helmet and through the top of the head, which can cooler 20 % to 25% temperature of your head than cycling without a helmet. Many helmets also come with a visor to keep the sun out of eyes and off of faces.
- Common Sense
To know common sense is vitally necessary for safety and avoidance of dangers. Go slower, take rest in a cool shaded area, drink 16-32 ounces water or sports fluids and pay attention to your physical status even in your daily riding. You’d better acquire some knowledge about bicycle fixing, survive in the wild and even taboos of foreign areas.
- Saddle Sores
Saddle sores are the problem that cyclists might not like to mention on their own initiatives. This issue frequently occurs, hence you need to know the ways of handling to decrease its likelihood. Your crotch is the first part to contact with your bike. If you get saddle score and careless and negligent in the cleanliness of score, you will be infected by bacteria entering you sweat glands, as a result, you develop an inflamed and swollen sore when touching the seat. It is proper to be guided by a good hygiene routine.
- Road Rash
Even though no one expects to confront this problem, you should learn from others’ experience or from your career of cycling. In addition to follow the traffic regulations, you should aware of infection control since you get abrasions and wounds after road rash. It is a must to remove foreign materials and clean the wound thoroughly. As to the larger wounds, go to the emergency room for help. The staff there will clean the wounds well and teach you some tips to take care of your wounds.
- Overuse Injuries
If you have a tendency to exercise long or overtrain at times, you will likely find yourself injured at some point. Over-exercise associates cramps and even affects your hip and knees.
If you find it painful with aches after riding, take a break. It is advisable that you follow a training program and gradually increase your time and intensity on cycling. It is better to wrap a bag of ice in a thin towel for your pain, but place the ice directly on your skin which may damage localized skin. Use ice bag to the injured or painful area for 15 minutes per hour for the first two days.
- Positioning Problems
Knees, ankles, hips, lower back, shoulders, and neck may be hurt not only by overuse but also by the positioning problems. When painful at these, you have to readjustment your position on your bike. If your bike doesn't fit perfectly, you ramp up your mileage too suddenly. Also, if you bend too far forward, your back, neck, and arms may become sore. If it is hard to find a suitable position that combats your pain or injury, try to get the suggestion of fit from the professional.
- Bad Road Condition
Cyclists may treat the bad road condition as a nightmare. The stuff includes wet leaves, litter, things-other-than-bikes in the bike lane, potholes, gratings, railroad tracks.
- Bugs
Is it terrible to get a face full of bugs when spring and summer time? A helmet, sunglasses and long-sleeved shirts are very helpful to solve this problem. Anthelmintic and some drugs to relieve itching should be prepared.
- Rear Visibility
Ordinary bikes haven’t mirror forward to see the rear. It is a latent danger for cyclists. Even you have a mirror, it’s still challenging. At times, you should be confidence about the rear cars or bikes behind you, and pay attention to the traffic rules.
- A Suitable Bike
A suitable bike is beneficial. So you should know how to find and fit a bike. However, a lot of people buy bikes for cheap price rather than features. If your bike is heavy, badly assembled, of questionable quality and safety, and come with no useful help, you might concern the new one.
- Finding Usable Bike Routes
Some websites are helpful for you to find good bike routes, such as Google which is getting better. Some of them will still favor expressways and over residential side streets. Finding good bike routes is a balance of safety, directness and how the slope of the hill it may be. It has a direct influence on your feeling of the cycling trip.
- Secure Bike Storage
Bike locks are a nuisance to use. Furthermore, they can only slow down the movement of the thief. They're really easy to unlock or even destroy, and once broken, bikes are pretty easy to remove and to sell. As the result, you have to buy another new bike. A lot of apartment lack of enough bike storage for cyclists and most of the bikes cannot be placed in safe areas.
- Weather Change
It is one of the greatest reasons to give up cycling to work or travel. The unpredictable weather is a big trouble. So weather forecast should be noticed and then take some actions.
- Navigation
Do you go crazy if when return from an epic ride to find your GPS didn’t record? Most people would be mad because it feels like they just wasted time and energy. A navigation tool is popular for recording the exercise and guiding routes. It would provide the route with the fewest cars, least amount of elevation gain, and the social feature so cyclists could communicate with others. You may have more time on protected bike lanes, less steep hills to get from point a to point b.
- Others' Worries
Provided that you enjoy cycling a whole lot more, but your coworkers needle you about my bike habit are one thing. Convincing others around you to get out on a bike is hard. Some people seem to be worried about safety on the road, taking longer to get where they're going, living too far, and arriving sweaty, among other things.
- Apps
Fashion young people may have apps for navigation, tips for cycling, cyclists communication. But it cannot avoid problems like tire pressure, accidents, and so on. Cyclists often travel to different places every day and ride in new ways and no app can update timely and comprehensively. Even some apps become a kind of dating app.
22.Dietary Problem
Cycling makes you eat more junk food, just as most long-distance sports. Sugars, candy bars, fast food, etc., made worse in the desire to buy much of your food. It is not cheap to get enough calories for heavy training from –dietary foods, so cyclists tend to large quantities of calorie-dense cheap food, which is helpful to your old age not riding at least 40 miles a day every day.
23.Muscle Imbalance
Do you know how to identify an athlete by their body and physical appearance even when they're not performing? A Long-term cyclist may be skinny, maybe with a gut, hunched posture, terrible tan lines, head-forward, sort of like an out-of-shape person with an office job but with better cardio fitness. So some cross training and weight training can attribute to alleviate this imbalance.
24.Weight Loss
Cycling, like swimming, is not a fully weight-bearing activity like running, hence puts you at greater risk of osteoporosis, fracture, and height loss in your old age. As cycling leads to increased metabolic rate, it helps in keeping fit and weight loss. This may not be the problem for people who are fat and obese but it is not expected by people who are underweight and trying to gain weight.
- Psychological Problems
Are you obsessed with cycling equipment, mileage, and other data about cycling exercise? When you fall into the competition of ranking among friends, you take cycling too seriously. Try to be positive towards your figures instead of blind superiority.
For cyclists, riding is much vivid and interesting though there are also certain risks associated with bicycling. These problems might not be noticed by every cyclist. So after learning these, you must know how to face and prevent existent and potential risks.