About Brian Expertise I can help set up a weightlifting program, give suggestions on specific exercises and how to deal with injuries. We can discuss your goals and effective ways to work towards them. I compete at powerlifting, and have been weightlifting for over 15 years.
Experience 15 years weightlifting experience, including competitive powerlifting.
Question While I know squats, lunges, and leg presses are good for the knees, should there be a cutoff point where I don't continue to develop my leg strength? For example, I only started doing traditional, barbell squats (not using a machine) and I am already up to nearly 300 pounds. On leg presses, which I've done much longer, I've gone from 500 pounds or so up to nearly 800 pounds. Surely at some point I am only damaging the knee and not helping it, or risk developing muscle but not tendon enough to support the load? In addition to this, my knees were sore last week, and while I believe it was mostly from switching to treadmill running from an elliptical trainer, I'd like to ensure I am not overdoing it on the weights. I've never had a knee injury and would like to keep it that way (while still mainting joint health as I get older - I am 27 currently).
Thanks!
Answer I'm not sure I would say that squats, lunges, etc. are necessarily "good for the knees" as you suggest. These exercises develop the muscles of the legs, needless to say, but I don't think you could say they do anything to improve the cartilage and ligaments of the knee joint. That's not to say that these exercises are necessarily "bad" for the joints either.
So, I'm not really sure how to answer your question. People with knee problems fall in to a few categories: 1. Being overweight will lead to knee problems due to the excessive load on the joints ALL THE TIME; 2. Injuries-despite surgical advances, once you tear cartilage or ligaments, the healing process is not always 100%; 3. Genetics-it seems that joint problems, and knee problems in particular, tend to run in families.
