Hi I’m Margaret MelioGuide And today I’m here to help you make decisions about what type of pole what type of handgrip you want for your pole. What type of adjustments that you want for your poles So? This is a long blog, and so we categorized it in chapters, so you can go right down to the section or just follow right, along with today’s blog So, thanks for tuning in And I’m, going to introduce not every single type of pole, but some of the more common poles that we see on the market today, And.

So let me just share with you one thing for you to consider when choosing a pole is the type of adjustment that’s involved when changing the height of your pole So. There are quite a few polls out there that involve a click-and-lock mechanism when bringing your poles to a shorter or longer height. This is really handy if you are sharing poles with somebody else or like myself as an instructor that you’re frequently changing the length of the pole to introduce the different poles to your clients, The other type of poles that you often see the adjustment change for is a twist-and-lock type And.

With the twist and lock you are going to have to literally you know, loosen it by rotating it one way, adjust the length and then based on the arrows that are indicated on the pole itself, you’d lock it back in place Now the issue I have with the rotational one is that for a lot of clients, if their grip strength isn’t what it once was, then locking it in place hard enough can be problematic in that when you’re putting weight through the pole, the pole will collapse So.

If anybody has you know, we can grip strength, one option here, but you have these types of poles or you like these poles. One option is to take the head of the pole and to place it down between your feet. Grip. It really tight with your feet, take both your hands and that allows you to tighten even more Now one other step beyond this and, depending on the head of the pole, that becomes easier or harder to do.

Some heads have almost like a flare to them and that allows you to get your feet on either side of the flare to hold the pole in place, so they can really get a good rotation on it. A couple of points here is with changing weather in the winter the metal will constrict, and so that will you know if you tie it really tight, and then you know in the springtime your metals expand a little bit.

It might be really tough for you to untwist it So. Keep that in mind. Another thing for you to consider is that, if you’re still not getting quite the twist or the strength that you would like garden, gloves or any type of rubber glove will really help you to either have a better twist on or off on whichever end you need it at So.

That’s one thing to consider: when choosing your poles is just how you end up adjusting those poles. Another thing is that, if you travel with poles, poles can collapse into different lengths So. There are some poles that come just full length, they’re the lightest, probably some of the more expensive poles, wonderful to use, but very impractical to travel with, because you have to travel with the entire length of the pole, which is similar to the lock key.

That only has a little this type of lock key. That only has a smaller adjustment, So you’re having to travel or try to pack a full length. Pole Some of the other poles that telescope will telescope to you, know a reasonable length and then you’ll have in each manufacturer or many of the manufacturers. They have them where they come into three parts: And that will allow the telescoping to occur at a smaller and smaller part, which makes it really practical for traveling However.

Having said that, it’s important that, when you readjust it that you readjust each part of the length so that, if you’re, you know getting an extra two inches on one part of the threefold that you get an extra two inch on the other or an inch and an inch where I’ve seen some clients bring me their poles and they’ve, adjusted it to five inches on one side and two inches on the other, and that doesn’t make for a stable, a pole So.

You want to make sure that all the parts are well-tightened and equally telescoped So. Those are things to consider when choosing a pole and that, insofar as the length of the pole and the travel ability of the pole, The next thing to consider is handgrip So. Each polling company has chosen different materials.

Some people are really partial. You know when walking that they have a cork surface for their hand. Grip is much more breathable, more comfortable, Other people, you know, are quite comfortable with having rubber So it’s really or hard plastic It’s, really a personal choice. The other most important thing, though, is how does your hand sit when you’re pulling and where’s the pressure through the hand so that you know whether, if you have some arthritis, if you have a weak handgrip Those are all things for you to consider And, so I’ll use these poles as an example When walking with the urban pole, the pressure that’s put when you’re doing your Nordic walking is through the outside border of the hand.

So the hand is in a very neutral position like this And that works fine, except for clients of mine that have some arthritic issues in the wrist and that loading can be a little bit. Uncomfortable The grips where there is an actual sleeve to put your hand into are certainly much easier and I’ve used them with clients that have weakened hand grips whether it’s from arthritis, whether it’s from you know missing digits, neurological issues that affect the grip of the hand, So that becomes really handy to have this type of sleeve With the sleeve.

You know you’re placing your thumb in and you’re wrapping the sleeve around And any of the companies that come with sleeves. The sleeves are identified with right and left on the little sleeve portion itself. The. One thing if you decided to go with sleeves to consider is how those leaves come off or on or do they come on and off? Some of them are fixed in place.

With, the more cost-effective poles you’ll have them, but you won’t be able to ungrip And. For me, that’s a big issue. My hands get really cold in the winter. If I use them in the wintertime. Then. For me, it’s really important that I have everything detached I’m, a bundled up. I have my mitts on or my gloves on.

I have this slipped into place with my mitts or gloves, and it’s not till the end that I go out and I clip things in place. And I also find it easier because I get so cold that reminding my readership here that I do live in Ottawa and it does get really cold. But I do get so cold that sometimes I can’t actually grip.

So I really do appreciate the ability to push through with these poles It’s a different, pushing through mechanism that doesn’t you know, you’re able to push through with a flatter hand and not rely so much on having any type of grip available too With, some companies. You know you have this, where they’ve cleverly put a little tag, so it doesn’t slip out So, it’s kind of intuitive, how to put your hand into it.

Whereas in other cases- and this is a Nordics there’s no tag, and so it is easier to slip out. So you have one more thing to kind of do: And when adjusting it, it’s important that you check in the store or when you order the poles as soon as you get them that it’s accommodating to your hand, I am rather petite, and so this one here is very, very big on my hand, despite it being a small and I, try to wrap it around, but it’s like it’s just I find it too big, where my hand is to sit in the sling As.

Well, the adjustability here something to give some thought to is you can make this closer and farther, which is a nice feature that the click on did not have You’re set at one length here, but the ease of adjustability, you know, is done through this mechanism that allows you to draw the sling through or not So, there’s also the style of pole, that’s very similar to a standard cross-country ski pole where you have the loop, But I often see the people, not my clients and others not using the loops properly So.

When using your loops, you want to imagine that you’re a little bunny going into a hole so you’re going in and then you’re going to now be grabbing the little bunny ears that you see here. So you grab the ears and that’s how your hand rest. So it’s in a little hammock And! That’s where the pushing off happens behind you is through the slings of the straps Now.

Just another point on when selecting poles and grips for yourself or the person that you love is that some of these hand grips can be confusing for individuals if their cognitive status is starting to decline. And I bring this up because it was one of the first signs I had when my mom started to get Alzheimer’s is I had bought her a pole.

She was a big walker and the concept of you know looking at something like this and seeing you know just the holes and where to put the hand in and where to loop it. It was all very confusing to her All right. Something else I want to bring up in terms of poles and selection of poles is the shock absorption that the pole is designed with or not And.

So, if you have any issues with wrists, elbows shoulders or you are wanting to avoid issues, then something to consider is how the design of the pole takes into consideration the ground impact forces So, for instance, in the urban pole. They have a divot here that shouldn’t be touched at all. Nor should it for any designs.

They should not be touched when adjusting the pole length One of the jobs that these pieces of rubber have is for absorbing some of the shock coming from the ground up towards your hand, Now. When it comes to this style, then that comes up through and because your hand is not directly in contact. Then you know some of the forces from the ground are lost through the sleeve.

That’s here Whereas in the urban pole. The design here is such that the V that you see here and the rubber tip is where the shock absorption happens. Having said all that it’s sometimes just by looking at the poles hard to decide and as soon as you go out, you will either hear a clanging or you feel a significant vibration happening when you’re walking with the poles So, depending on the surface that you’re going to be taking your poles on to whether it’s pavement versus soft surfaces, then that’s another consideration for you to make All right.

When deciding about pole length, we want to make sure that the pole can be adjusted so that, when you’re standing tall, your elbows by your side, bent at 90 degrees, that your hand is setting or set to the grip of the pole, Whether it be resting on the outside or whether it be position so that your hands and the sleeve are resting again at 90 degrees.

Now. That’s what I use for any of the types of poles, including the activator poles, The only time I change. It is that, if I notice, my clients, don’t have a big arm swing in their Nordic style technique, because the Nordic poles have a booty that sits on an angle. You want the pole to land on an angle So as you notice in the technique, you’re landing on an angle, the pole’s on an angle So.

If you don’t have a big arm swing, then you’re not going to have good interface between the base of the booty and the ground So. That’s when I’ll often lower the height of the pole for clients until either they develop a bigger arms swing, or they just simply keep it at that height because that’s what’s comfortable for them, Be it from you know for any reason that their arm swing is as it is, So all of these things.

You know that you have to kind of think about whether or not these are things that are going to bother you things that are going to allow you to wear mitts versus not wear, mitts or gloves So. Hopefully that gives you some insight into the different poles and choosing up poles.