At some stage I’m sure you’ve suffered from knee pain, and you’re not alone. Most of us have struggled with a dodgy knee at some point and it’s kept us from running around and doing what we love.
After a bunch of trips to the physio, yoga or a long time rested, it often goes away, but occasionally comes back to haunt us at a later date.
In my experience, much of the knee pain we get can be avoided if we look after ourselves better.
By looking after ourselves I’m specifically talking about:
- Stretching
- Rolling and massage
- Stretching
- Sitting position and posture
- Stretching
If your flexibility sucks, eventually it’s gonna bite you in the A$$.
I’m mostly talking about quad and hip flexor flexibility here, but you may be jacked up through your adductors on the inside of your legs, your TFL and ITB on the outer part of your leg and through your glutes and low back.
Rather than test quad and hip flexor length, I like to put people into a wall quad stretch. You’ll instantly know if you are tight in that region.
The wall quad stretch gets into the quads and hip flexors in one go.
It puts your pelvis in a good position so you can’t cheat your way through the stretch either.
If you struggle to get into the start position, you should be doing this stretch daily until you can last up to 5 minutes in the stretch.
Why so long? Because it is a big, stubborn muscle you use all the time and it needs time to relax.
Think about how much you use your quads in a week.
You may run for 20 minutes and do some squats and lunges for 10 minutes which is 30 minutes total.
Are you then stretching your quads for 30 minutes to help balance out the 30 minutes of quad dominant exercise you performed?
Probably not.
Using a foam roller is a great idea for the quads too.
Just hammer away on them until they aren’t so tight any more. I especially find tightness on the inside just above the knee and right through the middle up high.
30-60 seconds is a great place to start and just focus on the tight areas.
I’ve been using these rollers so long the standard ones are too soft, so I like the rumble roller for digging deep into my quads. But I have issues.
Wherever there is a problem,
look what’s going on above and below the joint.
So we’ve discussed the quads and hip flexors, lets see what else is above or below the knee.
Above the knee we still have the adductors, ITB/TFL region and glutes to stretch.
For the adductors I recommend a kneeling adductor mobilization. You slowly rock back and forth through range of the hip without pushing too hard.
It needs to be done regularly and just takes time to open up. I’d do 10-20 reps depending on how it feels.
For the glutes I like the elevated hip external rotation stretch. Start doing it on the ground and as you get more flexible put your front leg up on a couch or bench.
Again it’s best to hold this for up to 5 minutes. Work from 30-60 seconds up. Once you can hold it for 5 minutes, it’s probably doing ok.
The ITB and TFL region is the sheath of fascia and tissue over the outer leg and hip. We like to hip this with a foam roller as the first stop but you can stretch it too.
Below the joint I won’t get too specific, but common culprits are the feet, calves and peroneals.
You can roll your feet with a tennis ball and progress to a harder massage ball or cricket ball and then a golf ball. If you can stand on a golf ball, your feet aren’t the problem.
You can roll your calves with a foam roller or ball, as well as doing stretches for both heads of the calf muscle (gastroc and soleus) and all around 30-60 seconds.
The peroneals are the small muscle that runs up the side of your lower leg. You can hit it on the foam roller, just be careful not to overdo it. It’s only little. 30-60 seconds is plenty.
Why sitting sucks for your body
When you sit some muscles shorten and some lengthen to allow you to get into that position.
When you sit for long periods of time your muscles get used to staying short or long.
They also get stronger in some areas and weaker in other areas which then creates an imbalance when you stand up and walk around.
Some chairs are more terrible than others too. When you have a deep chair that causes your tailbone to tuck underneath you so your spine resembles a C shape, it’s time to find another chair.
There are ergonomic chairs which are ok and are better than bad chairs. Your back will often feel a bad chair immediately.
Then there are kneeling chairs and saddle chairs.
These last 2 put your hips into a better position and will leave you with less pain long term. They do take some getting used to.
I’m currently kneeling on a foam cushion on the ground alternating between 1 and 2 knees. But even that gets tiring, so I’ll go back to my seat soon which is a DIY saddle chair I was introduced to while in the US at a conference.
If stretching bores you, join a Yoga class or stretch in front of the TV.
On Monday I had the discussion with trainer Steve about regular stretching.
20 years ago we didn’t have time for stretching because we didn’t think it was necessary.
Now we stretch every day to stay mobile and out of pain. Pain and injury are great motivators.
The honest truth is, if you train hard and regularly, you are gonna have to recover hard and do the time with stretching & rolling. There’s no way around it.
So start by making a small amount of time each day and keep it as a habit you don’t break.
It’s far easier to maintain a small amount daily than to get injured and have to dedicate all your time to rehab.
If you want more of this stretching and mobility stuff, buy Kelly Starrett’s amazing book, Supple Leopard. It is life changing.
That’s it for the week.
This article is a great reference and may pay to bookmark or forward to a friend who struggles with knee issues.
Looking after your body is always worth it and far cheaper than regular visits to the physio.
Go do some stretching.
