Why Do We Need Exercises for Weak Knees?

Weak knees affects a few runners.

No matter if you are getting a knee surgical treatment or not, the very best method to lower the swelling and the discomfort of a weak knee is to reinforce the muscles around it. Even if you are getting a surgical treatment, a knee in great shape with sturdy muscles will recover much faster and will be conditioned throughout the recuperation duration. It will considerably reduce your recuperation time, after the surgical treatment, and it will recover quicker since the sturdy and energetic muscles will offer even more blood flow in the joint. Enough blood flow is crucial for a great recovery, particularly for a bad vascularised area such as the prone areas of the knee.

When you have a diagnostic of your knee trouble, in many cases, your physician will begin giving you activities to enhance your knees. The surgical treatment normally comes last, when no other technique worked. This generally suggests, that you must likely begin your knee reinforcing workouts now.

The New York times had an article on the issue of running and knees.

Running Makes your Knees stronger

In a Stanford University study researchers followed middle-aged, longtime distance runners (not necessarily marathoners) for nearly 20 years, beginning in 1984, when most were in their 50s or 60s. At that time, 6.7 percent of the runners had creaky, mildly arthritic knees, while none of an age-matched control group did. After 20 years, however, the runners’ knees were healthier; only 20 percent showed arthritic changes, versus 32 percent of the control group’s knees. Barely 2 percent of the runners’ knees were severely arthritic, while almost 10 percent of the control group’s were.

Debunking the myth that Running leads to degeneration of the knees

The word on the street is that running may weaken your knees but in another scientific study runners knees were scanned before and after 1997 Vienna Marathon. Ten years later, they scanned the same runners’ knees again. The results were striking. “No major new internal damage in the knee joints of marathon runners was found after a 10-year interval,”

According to Ross Tucker, a South African who blogs about running injuries he said the best solution for weak knees is targeted strength training. If you work on the the muscles that support your knees, hip stabilizers, quads, hamstrings you will have strong knees. It is weakness in one of these muscle groups that causes knee injury.

Another interesting solution I picked from comments on the NY times article was this one by a Dr. "The issue is weight, not running. The more you weigh, the greater the chance you will develop osteoarthritis as you age. The key is to remain slim lifelong."

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