Shoulder Pain from Metric Century

[Angliru]

A fellow club member with whom I finished a metric century on Saturday has informed me that she is experiencing sharp, throbbing pain in one of her shoulders as of that following Sunday. She is a personal trainer so is in excellent shape and never experienced pain in her shoulders before after doing similar rides of this distance. This route was pancake flat so it was a steady grind of being in the saddle for miles. She has been advised to take anti-inflammatories and to ice the shoulder and after 48 hours to alternate heat and ice as needed by another club member who has experience training high school track athletes. The bike she is riding is approximately 2 years old and as I mentioned she has never had issues like this before Does anyone have any idea what could be the cause of her shoulder pain?

 

[Red Rick]

It's not really a common injury is it? I for one have no idea what it could be, though I guess a doctor will know better than I do.

 

[lenric]

A fellow club member with whom I finished a metric century on Saturday has informed me that he she is experiencing sharp, throbbing pain in one of her shoulders as of that following Sunday. She is a personal trainer so is in excellent shape and never experienced pain in her shoulders before after doing similar rides of this distance. This route was pancake flat so it was a steady grind of being in the saddle for miles. She has been advised to take anti-inflammatories and to ice the shoulder and after 48 hours to alternate heat and ice as needed by another club member who has experience training high school track athletes. The bike she is riding is approximately 2 years old and as I mentioned she has never had issues like this before Does anyone have any idea what could be the cause of her shoulder pain?

Maybe her workouts are heavily overloading her shoulders and her bike isn't adequately configured to her physique, as in, the height of the saddle (among other things), which could strain even more her shoulders.

 

[Angliru]

Thank you for your responses. I saw her last night and she seems to be a little better but plans on being refit for her bike at a more reputable LBS. I was looking at her bike and she has one of the shortest stems that I've seen which tells me she could have gone for a smaller frameset. Maybe she is so compact on the bike ("scrunched" up, if that is an actual word) that she is hunching her shoulders while riding, creating tension in her shoulder.

 

[42x16ss]

That sounds quite possible from what you've said. Too much weight on the arms and shoulders from poor bike fit would be the most likely culprit.