I’m a rookie triathlete, so please accept my apologies in advance. Lately, an hour or two after a training ride, my left knee is sore. It’s not tender to the touch, it’s mostly when I try to extend it you can definitely feel it. If I just sit there, it’s uncomfortable. It’s consistently my left knee, and it’s only after cycling. It doesn’t hurt during the ride itself.
The pain/sore area is sort of above my kneecap… if I stand up straight and rest my thumbs on top of knobby knees, the pain would be pretty much right behind my thumb. It goes away after 12-24 hours but sure enough, flares up again after a ride.
I don’t want to aggravate something if it’s injury related, but at 35, let’s just say I’m kind of getting used to aches and pains. I mean - that’s why I started running and biking in the first place, to get into better shape.
I’m not looking for a diagnosis online, but has anyone run into this before? Does it sound like something fairly typical? I wanted to consider a professional bike fitting, but everything else seems OK - even my neck and shoulders feel better these days since I’m getting more and more used to riding in aero. But this knee thing is odd. Thoughts?
Sit in a chair.
Put your leg that hurts up on a chair across from you.
Have a friend put light pressure above the knee cap using their thumb and forefinger crease from above the knee cap about an inch up from the top of the cap.
Have said friend put light pressure down on the top of the knee cap by just slightly sliding the hand doing the gripping down a little.
Now tighten your quad muscle.
I get this myself somewhat…My bike fit is good and running doesn’t cause it. In my case it’s primarily aggravated by squats in the weight room.
An improper bike fit will cause this.
In big general terms you need to adjust the bike to recruit more glutes and less quads during the pedal stroke. What this means specifically depends on exactly how you are currently set up. It could be your seat is too low. It could be your seat is too far forward. It could be that your handlebars are too high perhaps. It could also just be plain old pedaling technique.
Make sure your cycling shoes have the cleats moved as far back towards the heel as they can go on the shoe. Another way to say it is that it would move your foot forward on the pedals. That’s a simple thing you should do just because it’s right for a number of reasons.
After that you can consider moving your seat back or increasing your hip angle some other way.