Master the Basics - Lunges
Next, in my mastering the basics series, I want to discuss lunges and their association with knee pain.
You haven’t got to look too far in the gym to find a trainee or trainer saying you “shouldn’t lunge” or you “shouldn’t take your knee past your toe” because it causes knee pain.
Knee Pain
The knee is a complex hinge joint with many muscular and connective tissue attachments, all of which can be a site of pain. And pain in the knee can be multifaceted. There are many reasons for knee pain, such as degeneration, dysfunctional anatomy, trauma, infection or disease.
As much as it’s important to increase the strength, mobility and flexibility of the knee, it’s also important to recognise some treatments for the knee go beyond simply exercising. So getting professional advice from a physio can be essential.
Let’s talk about lunges. Why the bad reputation?
This is simply because many people feel pain during the lunge, but this might be more correlation than causation. Lunges are unique in the fact there is locomotion and landing mechanics involved, making them a pretty complex exercise to perform. Learning exercise progressions and regressions is essential, and just because a lunge hurts your knees now doesn’t mean you can never do them. You might just need to find a different version.
Other exercises that involve locomotion are:
- Step-ups and step-downs
- Lateral lunges and lateral step-ups
- Reverse lunges
There are also exercises such as the Poliquin and Peterson step up, which are often used in the treatment of knee pain
One of the key challenges to the forward lunge (the version that causes knee pain most frequently) is landing and maintaining knee tracking on the way down, and the centre of mass shifts forward into the knee directly after the landing. So dialling the lunge back to a split squat can be an excellent way to manage this.
When working around pain exercises, sit on a progressive scale, it’s important to find the version that you can do pain-free, and build some tolerance to it before progressing the exercise.
No exercise is inherently bad for the knees or any other joint. It just depends on the person and the cause of the pain. For some people going knee over toe might be fine as part of their rehab. For others, using lunges as part of the rehab also might work. Whether or not generic advice on knee pain or off the shelf programs works is pretty much down to luck. For some people, the advice will be just what they need at that moment in time, and for others, it’s not. The reality is it’s up to you to try things, work hard and learn what to implement to solve your own knee pain problem.
Stay tuned next week for another instalment of Master the Basics and don’t forget to follow me on Instagram where I share exercise techniques, and show you how to maximise your training. I hope you enjoyed this blog post, if you have any questions I host a weekly Sunday Q&A session on my Instagram channel. Otherwise, please feel free to email me at andy@andyvincentpt.com.
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