Knee Excersise

[JAzze]

Please be careful with those knees, Grasshopper1486. You're too young to be hobbling around like I am.

As several posters have mentioned, it's next to impossible to tell you why you're having pain over the internet. But grinding and clicking noises on flexion can indicate damage to the meniscus.

You asked about training with ankle weights, too. I would only suggest you do slow resistance training with these. I know some fellas who used to do full speed kicks with ankle weights, and they have lots of knee problems as a result.

[Nitekon]

The vertical shin squat sounds alot like a 'split squat'. they are hard to do but much more affective than a lunge, I learned it at college. the split squat is awesome for developing the lower leg stabilisers(being VMO -the inside quad muscle, gluteus medius and tibialis posterior) the trick is to take a shorter stance than a lunge, keep your abs tight, back straight and drop straight down, this way your shin doesn't go past vertical. try doing it on the spot before moving forward or alteranting. I foiund the best help was to do it side on to a mirror or glass door so I could check my posture and shin position in my reflecting. As for ankle weights you really need to be carefull. some people can do it without trouble but because all the weight is at the ankle it this can pull the leg in an un natural fashion and result in hip and lower back pain as. Ther are better weight devices. One of them is almost like weighted short. you tie a strap around your waist then the connected small straps around your quads. this way no unnecessary pressure is on any joints of the body but still giving lower limb ressistnce.

[vapor]

Nitekon

Welcome to the site, and thanks for the great first post.

Can I ask that you go to the INTRO forum, and start a thread to tell us about yourself, so that we can give you a proper welcome?

vapor

[doogfood]

I know I'm digging up an old thread but I finally have time to give some input so here it is.

Squatting all the way down is not recommended due to the increase in contact pressure between the patella (knee cap) and the femur (thigh bone). When doing squats, this contact pressure increases the lower you go, and doing this kind of squat repetitively can cause the cartilage behind the knee cap to wear out over time due to the high pressure. Things like this can lead to what is clinically known as patellofemoral pain syndrome, or some of you may know this as chondromallacia, anterior knee pain, patella arthritis, etc.

To my knowledge, the safest form of a squat would be:
- don't bend the knees more than 90 degrees - to prevent excessive abrasion of the cartilage
- don't let the knees go further in front than the feet - if it does, then you are likely concentrating too much on the quads, and you're also prone to bending your knees more than 90 degrees
- toes should be pointing slightly outwards and your thighs should be in the same direction - many women tend to bend their knees inwards and this creates increased stress on the medial collateral ligament (MCL), the ligament in the inner side of your knee (the part that faces the knee, if you still don't understand, google it)
- keep your back straight the whole time - bending or extending the back repetitively is not good for the health of your back in general.
- feet flat on ground - if your heels or toes lifts up, then you either have a stiff ankle or your center of mass is moving forward/backwards each time you go down, which is simply incorrect mechanics of the exercise. Plus you can lose balance and thats never fun.

As for split squats, it doesn't train the VMO more than it trains the other quad muscles. People in the past used to think the VMO can be trained specifically for people with patellofemoral pain (the thing I talked about first) because it is considered good for them, but studies have disproved this. Also I don't see how it will train the posterior tibialis specifically too, but that is off topic so I'll stop here. Nevertheless, this is a good exercise but it may be tougher than regular squats because your quads and gluts of your front leg (and to an extent the quad of the back leg) are the main muscles that work when you are going back up. However, my experience teaching people to do this was tough because people tend to lean into their front leg and bend their knees a lot and struggle maintaining good form.

[medguy]

Well, if the pain in your knees comes from squats, why do them?
You can strengthen your legs using reclining leg presses and leg extensions.

[doogfood]

Originally Posted by medguy

Well, if the pain in your knees comes from squats, why do them?
You can strengthen your legs using reclining leg presses and leg extensions.

Actually reclining leg presses are the same as squat in terms of the biomechanical changes in movement it produces within the knee joint, the only difference is that it is lighter in intensity than squats since your body weight is partially supported by the inclining ramp.

Also depending on the nature of your knee injury, knee extension may also cause pain in the knee. But yes you are right, if it hurts in an unnatural way (not the typical muscle soreness), then the best thing to do is to rest and refrain from activities that produces the pain for a while and see if rest would make things better.