If your Knee Hurts… Your Surfing Hurts
What this article will not be is an anatomy lesson. What it will be is a few simple things for you to start doing if you’ve got some knee funk…. cause knee funk turns into surf funk. And knee pain when surfing is no fun.
Myofascial Leg Work… Get Rid Of Knee Funk
You can read below for a bit more info on the knee, and how the ankle and hip and their surrounding tissue can effect the joint.
What you need to takeaway is that the quality of your tissue surrounding the knee joint can massively impact the way your knee moves…. and the manner in which your knee moves, or doesn’t move can cause pain.
So, if there’s ongoing pains (and an MRI has ruled out specific acute trauma), a good place to start looking is the muscles and tissue above and below the joint….. so get into some good ole’ myofascial release work.
Here’s a really good instructional video I did for Surfing Waves about Hip Mobility Stretches. Most people don’t stretch properly, or don’t correctly isolate the intended muscle groups.
This video will walk you through the good stuff for hip stretches. Yeah, you gotta loosen up your hips man!
Once you’ve been going through that tissue work pretty religiously for a few weeks, check out the video below about Hip Strengthening work.
This is the article the goes along with that vid, and delves into specific things to do with exercise and surfing with knee pain. How To Surf With Knee Pain
Hey Man, Your Knee Is Stupid
The knee will basically do what the ankle and hip tell it to do. What that means is that the knee is somewhat of a “dumb” joint. If the ankle isn’t moving properly or has a dysfunction, the knee can become aggravated.
If the hip isn’t moving properly or presents abnormal tensions and immobility, the knee can become cranky. The knee is a relatively stable joint (it should be), it’s a hinge joint that moves primarily in the sagittal plane, straight forwards or backwards.
Yeah there is some rotational aspects of the knee joint, but it basically is a hinge joint. So when these exceptionally mobile joints above and below (ankle and hip) aren’t moving the way they should be (they should be highly mobile), the body will place forces through the knee joint, which will piss it off.
You need to make sure you’ve got adequate hip mobility, ankle mobility, and a strong core. If those things are in order, your knee should likely behave, not always, but very likely.
Other Good Stuff For Your Knees
More Ankle Mobility… You should be doing some type of ankle mobility work before your workouts!!!
Don’t Eat Shitty Food. If you have chronically painful or inflamed joints, you need to start looking at the food you’re putting into your body. Your nutrition will heavily dictate your systemic inflammatory status. If you’re always inflamed, in pain, and swollen, clean up your food….. Lucky for you I’ve written about it!!!!
Surf Nutrition – Top Foods to Fight Joint Pain Get the lowdown on what foods to avoid (should be common sense but there seems to be a lot of idiots out there), and what foods you should specifically add to your diet.
There’s plenty of stuff for you to work on…get your knees healthy.
Improve the Way You Move
Eliminate Pain, Prevent Injury, and Move Better in the Water.
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