Knee pains

I am pretty new to riding. I am now in to my third week of riding and I am experienceing a pain in the lower part of my knee. I know that being new that I will have pains and I have the normal back and leg pains. I was just wondering if it was normal to have pains in my knees and joints. Any advice would be helpful thanks.

 

I had significant pain in both knees when I started cycling and the pain lasted for some months. I also had some knee pain before I started riding as a result of many years doing squats. The knee pain got worse when I began to cycle but eventually my knees adjusted and got used to riding.
I can give you one tip I found in a magazine and realised one little mistake I may have been making. The article recommended standing up quite frequently on the bike at medium gradients as this takes much of the pressure off the knee. What I tend to do is stay seated even on big hills and really grind with my legs. I imagine I must really be stressing my knees (although they don't ache at this time).
If your knees are really hurting go see a physio but try and find ways to de-stress them for a time (lowering your gears and riding on the flat more often). Also allow yourself some rest days during the week to give your knees a break.

 

I've had knee pain, and have done a lot of research, talked with docs. and done physical therapy. Here is some of what I have learned:

1) Make sure your seat is at the correct height. If it is set too low, it will stress the patellar tendon (below the kneecap).

2) STRETCH!! Stretch your hamstrings, IT Bands, quads, glutes, and calves at least after every ride, and preferably several times a day. This is one of the most important things you can do. Go online to find good stretches

3) Take it easy for a while. Spin at higher cadences instead of pushing big gears.

4) If the pain does not abate, find yourself a good sports PT, go for several visits, and do the prescribed exercises at home. I did, and it essentially cured me.

 

Thanks for the advice. The pain is nothing to bad. It is more like a paper cut of knee pains. It is a little uncomfortable but, not enough to feel like I need to stop riding. I just wanted to make sure that I wasnt doing anything that was going to cause me permanent damage.

 

If you are experiencing any joint pain, I would not brush it off as a minor irritation. Get to the root of the problem as fast as possible. One read responsed with seat height adjustments as a potential cure and I would agree. If you are riding a bike that has not been fitted by a professional, you may have more problems than just your knees. All to often, we feel we can purchase a bike, through in the car and then ride like the wind, but that dream quickly comes to an end at the first sense of pain.

Get your bike professional fitted before you try to make adjustments. I know people, don't believe that they need a cycling coach, but this is one area that a coach would have made sure never happened to begin with.

Stephen Duarte
C3 Performance Labs

 

I was fitted to the bike. I was just wondering if this was a common problem. I am planning on going back in the next couple of days and seeing if there are any adjustments that can be made to help. I was just asking for a little extra advice from you guys.

 

My boss at work said the very same thing to me. She used to ride and represent a major cycling firm till she left off riding. She told me I should get a bike fitted to my particular specifications rather than just ride on a purchased second-hand bike as I do.
One problem I do have is shoulder and wrist pain. There is no specific injury that has inhibited shoulder strength but I feel a deep burn when I'm in bed. My wrists hurt too. I suspect the problem is caused by my riding position as I rest my wrists on the top of the bars and seldom use the drops. My seat is also very high almost as a sprinter would use as it just feels right for me that way. But probably I press down too hard on my wrists or don't swap position enough - which causes my shoulders to ache. Also I climb a lot and there's a real pull on the upper body as you go uphill in the drops.
To be honest I feel comfortable in this position and don't consider myself to be in an unatural posture. My back is more or less straight and my legs get maximum leverage. The problem is simply I rest heavily on my wrists and so the shoulders over-tense. Maybe I should raise my handle-bars as they are usually lower down than other bikes I've compared.

 

As a self-test, I'd recommend that you drop a string with a weight on the end from your kneecap almost down to the ground. When you are in your riding position on the seat (you may need someone to hold your bike or hold yourself up against a wall) put your pedals to be exactly parallel to the ground (ie, front pedal in the 3 O’clock position). The string from your kneecap should intersect the pedal axle (or at least be close).

For people that experience knee pain below or under the kneecap (under the kneecap is cartilage related and below the kneecap is tendon related but both are caused by the same lateral torsion on the kneecap), ensure the string is never ahead of the axle (a little behind may be ok). If it is forward, then your bike isn't fitted correctly. Either one of two adjustments can take place to correct this.

1) Raise the seat.
2) Set the fore/aft of the seat further back.

As mentioned earlier, it's noticeable enough that you decided to make a post. I'd ensure I monitor the situation closely. Knee pain shouldn't accompany cycling.

 

Ill do that thanks for the advice. I appreciate the help.

 

if you have clipless pedals, check that they're not crooked. That can cause knee pain as well. muscle pain isn't too bad, but a torn tendon or ligament is!
I actually tore a ligament in my knee in late april, from a fall--totally unrelated to any bike injury. it's kept me off my bike for a little over a month. . .and now I've got pink eye from my contact lenses.

 

excerpt from: Bike Fit 101

problem: Front of knee hurts:
reason: Seat too low and/or too far forward, straining knees
fix: Raise seat; may need to move seat further back as well

problem: Back of knee hurts:
reason: Seat too high, over-extending leg
fix: Lower seat

 

i have been increasing distances and climbing distances in prep for the etape. Gradually I have developed an aching pain in the front of my knee that starts at the top of the patella and extends around the medial aspect to underneath it. I have also noticed that my right foot is pushing outwards - I have quite an externally rotated position at rest so I have tried to compensate for this by adjusting my cleats inwards. I have found this helps. Secondly I saw a PT and she found that I had very tight hamstrings and IT tracts - she recommended stretches and deep tissue massage. These have also both helped. However the aching pains is still there but to a much lesser degree - I will try moving my saddle up in small increments - at the moment the front of my knee is exactly over the centre of the pedal with the crank arms level. Perhaps that will knock the pain on the head completely.

 

I'm no doctor, but........

Chrondomalcia is often miss-diagnosed as being patella tendonitis; both conditions usually involving pain in the same spot (under or very low on the knee cap). As you may have guessed, this happened to me.

I can't remember the exact treatment for patella tendonitis, but I cured my persistent chrondomalcia in TWO DAYS (!!) by performing some simple straight-leg, weighted kicking exercises to strengthen the rectus femoris.

 

out of curiousity...which ligament did you tear? I had a grade 2 acl sprain almost 2 years ago and my knee has never been the same.

 

it wasn't my ACL! I believe is was my lateral collateral.
It was on the front of my left knee, towards the inside. I tore it in late april... for daily walking it's back to normal. but I can't dance or participated in marching band unless I wear a neoprene knee brace, but in a month or so my knee should be back to normal.
however, my kneecap or patella often feels... different...not pain, or discomfort, just different.

 

I have experienced the same pain you describe. It's just a soft persisting pain, right? No jolts or ups and downs, just a light persisting pain?

With me it got worse during long rides and heavy climbes. After a while also an increasing pain developed in my left hip.

I agree with mingcat9. The pedal plates under the shoes have to be aligned exactly. There may not be any dis alignment in your knees caused by the plates. It's millimeter work and takes hours to get it perfect. Cycling, changing a little bit, cycling again, changing some more..... Untill it feels a hundred percent comfortable and the pain disappears.

Too low a saddle maybe induces the same kind of pain.

 

I also have an unexpected injury to deal with, concerning the knee area. 2 days ago I was climbing some rolling hills and noticed a kind of burning feeling that generated somewhere around the knee, radiating down the leg. On later examination I found the inner area of the leg, three inches or so above the kneecap is painful and obviously strained. I'm not sure whether it's more of a frontal hamstring or ligament strain right around the knee area.
In my case it seems like my knee area is too weak to sustain intensive cycling so I'll be changing my whole approach and using weight work to stabilise the area and find out where the imbalance lies.

 

After talking with the guy at the LBS he said the problem was that my tendons were not as strong as my muscles. He said that when you first start riding that you have to kind of take it easy. He recommended that I log in about 500 miles before I start going at it real hard. He said that I just had to give my body a chance to get in shape because cycling required different muscles and stuff from other sports.

 

What your LBS has told you may be right or may be wrong. What they've said can be true but whether it's true for you or not is an entirely different story. If you choose to believe them, ensure that your bike fit is 100% so that you're not suffering needlessly waiting for your tendons to catch up to your muscles.

 

I have been experiencing pain on the right side of my right knee. The doctor tested both legs and found that the left was stronger than the right (depressing the clutch for so many years). He recommended the following;

1) stretching the quads and the hamgstring before doing anything
2) weight training; lunges, leg curls, leg lifts, and leg press...one leg at a time with the leg press.
3) use speedplay toe clips or at least something that gives your knee some side freedom.

I haven't been totally relieved of the problem, but do believe it will go away with more easy road miles coupled with the weight training. Oh yes, standing up and stretching during a ride seems to alleviate the problem as well.

Good luck!