“Strengthen it”
It’s the go-to response from specialist coaches and trainers when it comes to helping someone with knee pain but there’s a HUGE mistake that they are making… because strength training isn’t actually what you think it is.
When most coaches think of strength training, they think of squats, glute strength and other traditional strength building exercises.
But when I think of strength training, I think of improving the range of movement of a joint in as many different directions as possible.
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Why?
Because if joint is restricted in movement (in any given direction), the surrounding muscles cannot fully contribute to controlling the movement of that joint – which means it’s not functioning at full capacity.
And that results in less overall strength.
And since it’s these same movement restrictions that lead to pain, improving the range of movement is by far the most effective first step on the strength spectrum that we can make.
Of course, we can use traditional strength building actions to improve the range of movement, but it’s not the ACTION here that counts – it’s our INTENTION.
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It’s even possible to use external load like dumbbells to increase resistance during these multi-directional movements, but again, it’s not the LOAD that counts, it’s our REASONING.
As coaches, if we’re simply adding traditional, one-dimensional squats and deadlifts to our programming, thinking that the more resistance we add, the better our people will be protected from injury, we’re truly mistaken.
All that happens in this scenario is that we stiffen the body (which eventually leads to its own injury problems).
But if we acknowledge that the building REAL strength and resilience is more about keeping the joints open and moving than it is about adding load, we’ll be helping our people avoid injury, out of pain and accelerate them towards amazing performance results!
If you’d like to know more, I’d invite you to check my FREE training called “The Injury Hacker’s Solution to Knee Pain” here