Knee Hurts

[GqArtguy]

Ok I wake this morning and my knee hurts. It hurts on the right leg and right at the lowest end of the vastas medialis (and under it). It hurts to do a leg extension-type movement or to squat. When I squat, it hurts the most at the parallel but then subsides when pass that. I feel it more in the eccentric than the concentric.

Its weird because I didnt do any leg work yesterday (i did split jerks, push presses, and rows) and havent banged my knee or ever been injured in this area, I just woke up feeling like this. I tried rubbing some icy hot on it but that didnt do anything. What gives?

I should note that it doesnt hurt to touch the affected area, just to move it. I have to sit down a lot as a student and all but I do stretch statically and dynamically and nothing weird has happened recently that I can think caused this. It has assuaged slightly over the past few hours, but I still want to know what caused this.

[Bill Hartman]

Split Jerks and push presses are leg work. Both use the stretch shortening cycle quite a bit.

Was it the first time you've done split jerks in a while?

Remember as you drop into the split or push press you have a pretty intense eccentric contraction to resist further knee flexion. Eccentrics tend to favor loading at the tendon and musculotendinous portion of the muscle (thus the SSC).

If I'm not mistaken you favor slower eccentric training a la powerlifting? If you're not used to the faster eccentrics, you'll most likely need to condition your connective tissues prior to including the faster Oly variation.

If it doesn't resolve quickly, bryanc's drop squat program may be a good place to start along with some ART or other soft-tissue work.

To condition, you can start to work into dropping into the split without weights or some lower intensity jumping progressing from 2 foot jumps to single foot jumps as you tolerate the intensity.

ME and Repetitive effort methods don't promote a great deal of reactivity due to the slower eccentrics. Your dynamic day most likely is insufficient to maintain your reactive abilities to the degree that the olys require. When you're symptom free, try using periodic reactive bench throws (rebound bench presses), plyo push-ups and reactive squats/jumps to maintain reactive ability or simply keep using oly variations like your split jerks, split cleans, or split snatches.

Bill

[GqArtguy]

Split Jerks and push presses are leg work. Both use the stretch shortening cycle quite a bit.

Was it the first time you've done split jerks in a while?

Yes.

If I'm not mistaken you favor slower eccentric training a la powerlifting? If you're not used to the faster eccentrics, you'll most likely need to condition your connective tissues prior to including the faster Oly variation.

Normally yes but for the past 9 weeks Ive been doing tons of speed pulls and a lot of fast front squatting to build up my legs and bring up my glutes which werent firing properly.

If it doesn't resolve quickly, bryanc's drop squat program may be a good place to start along with some ART or other soft-tissue work.

Where is that program?

To condition, you can start to work into dropping into the split without weights or some lower intensity jumping progressing from 2 foot jumps to single foot jumps as you tolerate the intensity.

Ya know, the weird thing is that when I split jerk, its my left foot that goes forward. And when I do push presses, I dont split.

ME and Repetitive effort methods don't promote a great deal of reactivity due to the slower eccentrics. Your dynamic day most likely is insufficient to maintain your reactive abilities to the degree that the olys require. When you're symptom free, try using periodic reactive bench throws (rebound bench presses), plyo push-ups and reactive squats/jumps to maintain reactive ability or simply keep using oly variations like your split jerks, split cleans, or split snatches.

OK.

[Bill Hartman]

The drop squat program is here

http://forums.jpfitness.com/cgi-bin/...=000069#000002

The knee extensors of the rear leg in the split also absorb a great deal of energy so it can affect either leg.

The quick dip of the knees prior to the split and in the push press is actually a pretty powerful application of SSC, so again you can irritate without the split.

Bill

[GqArtguy]

Alright Bill,

Ill try the program if it doesnt clear up. Thanks!