So I have been feeling lots of pain my my left leg. Before I went over seas doc said it was runners knee and I should lay off it for a bit. I not- reluctantly agreed and have been off it. I am in Japan now and decided to go see another doc. This doc measured my leg around my quad and said I was 4cm small on my left leg than right. He told me to stretch and then "get it stronger". didnt tell me anything specific. How do I get it stronger? any help? thanks
You need advice on strength training?
I have this problem too. I have had a string of consecutive injuries always in my left leg (IT band, hamstring syndrome, runners knee, soleus pain, etc....). I believe my left leg has been smaller/weaker before these injuries but now my it is significantly smaller than the right. Unfortunately, the way to reverse the atrophy is to strength train but that also aggravates the injuries that weakness caused in the first place. It seems like a cycle that's impossible to escape. Let me know if you find out how to strengthen with a knee injury.
Stick leg wrote:
I have this problem too. I have had a string of consecutive injuries always in my left leg (IT band, hamstring syndrome, runners knee, soleus pain, etc....). I believe my left leg has been smaller/weaker before these injuries but now my it is significantly smaller than the right. Unfortunately, the way to reverse the atrophy is to strength train but that also aggravates the injuries that weakness caused in the first place. It seems like a cycle that's impossible to escape. Let me know if you find out how to strengthen with a knee injury.
First of all, if you are chronically injured, you need to seriously consider finding another sport.
However, to answer your question--very often, it is possible to strengthen the quads without causing additional damage or pain to an injured knee. What you must do, in such a situation, is figure out which exercises, or ranges of motion, do not stress the injured area. For example, when I had an articular cartilage defect in my right medial trochlea, I could not do leg extensions or squats, but I could do limited range-of-motion leg presses.
In general, when dealing with a strength discrepancy, it is helpful to train unilaterally, and to perform no more reps/use no more weight with the stronger limb than you can with the weaker limb.
Thanks dude! The thing is I can squat, front squat no problem. its just the aerobic stuff that enflames the knee. I think I might stay off the squats because my squatting form is shit and probably one of the reasons why one leg is so much smaller than the other.