Frustrating knee pain (argh.)

[lyca]

Hi, all! Here's my dilemma:

When I started cycling, I was slightly worried about my knees because of an injury from childhood. They held up wonderfully, though, even after I went clipless.

And then,

One day, on a very flat route, I had to adjust my shoes. They seemed to be too loose, so I strapped them extra-tight.

Silly, silly me.

After riding for about 10 miles in that way, I could really feel the strain on my knees. On every ride since I've had some knee pain, especially going up hills or starting again if I've forgotten to shift down.

Should I try adjusting my cleats? The pain is on top of the knee and feels like I have to "crack" the joint but can't because I'm clipped in.

[KnottedYet]

Is your saddle too low or too far forward for your knee mechanics?

Do you need more float in your clipless set up?

It almost sounds like you were using loose shoes to substitute for more float, and when you tightened the shoes you "lost" your "float" and ticked off your knee.

I have a grumpy knee, but keep it happy with a saddle set farther back and super-floaty clipless and medial-wedged shoes.

[Zen]

Fit & Float

[lyca]

Is your saddle too low or too far forward for your knee mechanics?

Do you need more float in your clipless set up?

It almost sounds like you were using loose shoes to substitute for more float, and when you tightened the shoes you "lost" your "float" and ticked off your knee.

Hmmmmmm......perhaps!!! There really isn't a ton of float in my set up right now...I have spd pedals...I'll see if I can loosen them any.

I was pondering my saddle situation on my ride today and wondered if I needed to take it back a bit. I'll fiddle with it and see if it makes a difference. After reading a bunch of threads on pro bike fittings, I'm beginning to realize that I should probably go get one.

And thus begins my quest for the lost float....

(Thanks, knott!)

[WindingRoad]

I have had some experience with the knee pain issue. I finally had a custom fitting done and that helped tremendously. I found out that my arches are uber high and clipping in and forcing them flat was causing the pain. After getting some shims put under my cleats, my knees have been doing much better. You might want to consider a fitting.

[Mr. Bloom]

I feel your pain - unfortunately.

There are many posts if you do a search for "knee pain".

Here's a helpful site that was referenced on one:

http://www.kneepaininfo.com/

[onimity]

I have bad knees and accordingly have great love for the bike fit guy at my LBS. He positioned my cleats for me based on my knee position/rotation and adjusted my saddle just a tiny bit...made a huge difference.

Anne

[ehirsch83]

One thing to think about, you say that the majority of the pain is coming when you are going up hills or when you forget to shift down.

If you are pushing to big of a gear- knee pain is bound to happen!! So my advice would be to spin at a higher cadence in a smaller gear versus mashing a bigger gear, and see if that helps for a little while- even stay in the small chain ring for your whole ride.

Also fit and float like everyone else said!

[TsPoet]

Fit & Float

+1
if tightening your shoes did it, sounds to me like you need more float.
Fit never hurts.

[Julibird]

fit+float...and arch supports in your shoes and Speedplay cleats and pedals. That does the trick for me. I too used to keep my SPDs loose - until one fell off! Lovin' my Speedplays. If you wear an orthotic for running or other sports, don't forget to use them in your bike shoes too.

Good luck!

[Mr. Bloom]

One thing to think about, you say that the majority of the pain is coming when you are going up hills or when you forget to shift down.

If you are pushing to big of a gear- knee pain is bound to happen!! So my advice would be to spin at a higher cadence in a smaller gear versus mashing a bigger gear, and see if that helps for a little while- even stay in the small chain ring for your whole ride.

Also fit and float like everyone else said!

While I acknowledge the conventional wisdom of what Emily is saying, I'll also point out that I always get knee pain from low gear/high cadence pedaling.

I'm not challenging conventional wisdom, I'm simply pointing out that in some cases, higher cadence may be a problem.

lyca: I also extol the virtues of biofreeze (or the generic equivalents...) for dealing with the symptoms while you work to identify the cause.

[Bad JuJu]

+1 for Speedplay pedals, and you might also consider wearing a cho-pat strap on your knee for support, depending on what the problem is with your knee joint.

My orthopedist told me my kneecaps are ever so slightly turned outward, compared to most people's knees (lucky me ), and as a result I need my feet to sit at kind of a weird angle on the pedals to keep my knees from complaining (though only the left is really insistent about this). My LBS guy recommended Speedplay Frog pedals--they have about a million degrees of float, which is great for my whiney knees.

I also wear a cho-pat strap on my left knee for support. There's some controversy over whether this contraption is really effective, and maybe I'm a victim of placebo effect, but my knee seems to feel much better when I wear the thing.

[OakLeaf]

Fit, fit, fit. I'm not really a believer in float (once you find an alignment that fits properly, why would you want your foot and leg to be able to get out of that alignment?). But I know some people swear by float, so go for it if it helps.

Lyca, what was your childhood injury? A loose ACL can predispose you to patellofemoral dysfunction. I don't know about anything else.

Mr. S, it sounds like you might be dealing with patellofemoral issues like Juju and myself. If each pedal stroke is irritating your knee because of alignment issues, then the faster you're bringing your muscles, tendons and bones through their range of misaligned motion, the less opportunity you have to force your knee into proper alignment, and the more times you're doing it over a fixed distance, the worse problems you're going to have.

Juju, I wear PF straps to do aerobics, and strength moves like squats and lunges, but not on the road bike. (I just get the Futuro brand at the drugstore, which are much cheaper and more widely available, and chafe less than brand-name Cho-Pat also.) I don't need the straps on a bike that fits me (notably, they do help when I'm doing longer errands on my town bike, which has crankarms too long for me). But also, they tend to cut off the circulation to my calves if they're tight enough to stay on through the large ROM of cycling. There's no question in my mind that the straps do what they were designed to do, but they're not a substitute for good body mechanics. Since I started working the Chi Running method, I don't need the straps for running any more! Woo-hoo! Now I wonder if I can wean myself off the foot orthotics?!

[pinkychique]

What I have heard, after fit, is that knee pain can also be attributed to muscle imbalances so that the knee is being pulled side to side. If one of the quad muscles on one side of the knee is stronger than the other, things get pulled out of alignment. I do weights just for this, low weight, high reps are the way to go.

I do knee extension, hamstring curls, squats, and hip weights.

good luck!

[KSH]

Switching to Speed Plays and getting some float on my pedals... and getting a computer with cadence and keeping my cadence between 90-100 fixed my accute knee pain.

It took about 2 months of slow riding to get past it... after the damage was done... but those two things mentioned above are what did it. No knee pain since there.

Good luck!