Module 16: How To Train Legs When You've Got Bad Knees

An Inner Circle member -- Demitri -- recently asked me for some tips on training with knee pain. And that question is right in my wheelhouse as I've suffered (and trained through) pretty severe knee pain for years now.

The simple truth is this: The "sidelines" are littered with people who claim they used to be in great shape, until an injury derailed them. Seriously, if the topic of working out comes up at a party an older, fatter guy will ALWAYS feel the need to tell you how he used to be in better shape than you... until he got injured.

But here's the cold hard truth: Everybody gets injured to getting and staying in shape is finding ways to work around it.

Knees are tricky. Your knees can hurt even if you didn't get injured. They just hurt because you get old. Sorry, but it's true.

Here's a long list of things I've tried that did NOT work...

Voodoo Wraps
Ice Massage
Foam Rolling
Mobility Work
Correcting Tracking Issues
Icing.
Not Icing.
Stretching.
Complete Rest
Active Recovery
A.R.T.
Tens Machine
Scraping
Changing Squatting Form
Not Squatting At All
Shockwave and Laser Therapy
Dry Needling
Ankle Exercises
Hip Exercises
Mega-dosing fish oil
Almost any other joint-fixing supplement you can think of
Taking 8x the recommended amount of Ibuprofrin
Eccentric squats

But after years of experimentation, here's a few things that have helped:

#1) Couch Stretch 2x per day.

I talked about the couch stretch a couple weeks ago in an Inner Circle advisory. Here's a pic.

Excessive sitting and tighten up your leg muscles which can "pull" on the knee and cause some knee pain.

#2) Always train calves first.

This one has helped a bunch. On any leg training day, I try to get a good pump in my calves before squatting or whatever leg exercise I'm going to do. I don't know why this helps but it seems to help anyone who tries is.

#3) Bike for cardio

If you have knees issues, running is only going to make things worse so opt for lower-impact cardio. Slow biking seems to work wonders. It floods the area with blood and seems to speed healing.

#4) Ditch Squats. (What!)

If you have knee issues, then maybe try hanging up squats for a while. Personally, front squats work better for me. But when things get really bad I have to put any type of squatting "on the shelf" for a while.

Does this mean you can't train legs? Nope, you can still train legs. The key is finding exercises that allow you to train your legs without hurting the knees.

Here are a few exercises I've used over the years:

*Heavy loaded carries.

*Single Leg, rear-elevated split squats. (Keep these slow, use light weight and do 20 or more reps per leg.)

* Broken Treadmill boogie. (This is when you go on the treadmill, but don't turn it on and just manually walk on the treadmill, pushing the tread with your feet. You can do this standing forward or backwards and it really blasts the legs without any impact.

Bonus tip: L-Glycine can possibly help speed up healing.

Here’s the exact brand I’ve been using.

This stuff is powdered and mixes easily in water. I use 5 grams (1 teaspoon) in the morning and 5 grams (1 teaspoon) in the evening. As an added bonus, many people report it helps you fall asleep faster and improves sleep quality. (I haven’t noticed that.)

Matt Marshall, certified personal trainer and founder of Fitness Under Oath

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