Numb toes. Any sports medicine experts here?

[staceysue]

Yesterday was the longest ride I've ever done, and about 40 miles or so in I started getting a little numbness in my left great toe. By the end of the trip (64 miles) both of my feet were numb from the balls forward. Numb numb - like, I thought I might fall when I got off the bike. As soon as I got off the bike, the numbness went away.

My saddle feels comfortable to me. I just have a little soreness at the very top of my inner thighs, in the crease where the thighs and privates meet. It feels like something a little bit of chamois cream would have prevented. That does seem to be the area where a lot of my weight sits when I ride, though. The rest of my weight's on my sit bones.

I don't know how I'd even go about finding a better saddle - this one is so comfortable that I never would have thought it would cause a problem. It's not like I can try a saddle out for 60 miles before buying.

Where's your weight supposed to sit when you ride? I must be compressing a nerve.

[Kalidurga]

Sounds like hot foot, which is discussed here fairly frequently. From what I've read, your weight should ideally be evenly distributed between all three points of contact: bars, pedals and saddle. But hot foot's got more to do with your shoes &/or pedals/cleat position than with your saddle.

There are a few threads in this Search result that might be helpful for you: http://forums.teamestrogen.com/searc...archid=2611548

[tulip]

+1. Also make sure your shoes are not too small or too tight. Were you wearing thicker socks because of the cool weather?

[staceysue]

Thanks for the help!

The link didn't work for some reason, so I did a google search for 'hot foot'. The articles I'm reading describe it as very painful and often caused by tight shoes or small pedals. I have loose shoes and platform pedals, but still got me thinking . . . I had it happen once before, only mildly, and I was wearing the same shoes that time.

I'm going to try different shoes! Thanks for your help, Kalidurga and Tulip!

[KnottedYet]

You can get hotfoot on platform pedals, too.

The big issue is compression on the nerves that run through the ball of your foot (kind of between the "knuckles" of your foot)

Anything that will squish that neighborhood too much can cause hotfoot. Tight shoes/socks, concentrated pressure, swelling feet, dropped metatarsal heads, no metatarsal arch support, Morton's Neuroma, constant pressure, high heel shoes.

You can even get hotfoot on a stairclimber or eliptical trainer or barefoot on your kitchen floor while doing calf raises.

As long as you know what it is (someone is getting squished in your forefoot) you can play around with the conditions your forefoot experiences until you find the cause.

Sometimes feet just get juicy after you ride a while, and you need to loosen the laces partway through a ride.

[staceysue]

There isn't any pain, though - just numbness.