T Nation

Knees Rotated Outward?

Beginners
#1

Someone I know has knee problems and was telling me about it. He said that the doctors told him the muscles on the outside of his leg were too strong compared to his inner legs and it was pulling his kneecaps outward. The rotation resulted in some bad knee problems for him.

This sounded a little strange to me, especially since the doctor’s rehab didn’t really help him but going to a chiropractor did. Has anyone heard of problems like this? If so what exercises can you do to correct it or prevent it?

#2

I think I have the same thing, I have tendinitis in my right knee. At first I was told I had the same muscle imbalance and was given rehab exercises to do. These were simple things like flexing my leg with it straight in front of me and lifting my leg in the air while laying on my back. None of this helped.

A few weeks ago I went to the chiropractor because I was having lower back pain when I deadlifted. He said that it’s not actually my lower back buy my hips that hurt, specifically my SI joint. My left hip hurt because my right hip was rotated. My body was trying to compensate for the imbalance and it screwed stuff up. He also said that it could be causing the tendinitis in my knee. He gave me an adjustment (basically cracked my back) and now I have much less pain when I deadlift. I’m expecting after some more time I’ll have no pain. The knee is the same but since it is a cumulative injury to a joint I’m expecting it to take a lot more time to heal. I do have to go back to the chiropractor every week for an adjustment until I’m straightened out.

#3

He also said that the hip rotation is common and can come from sitting on a wallet among other things.

#4

[quote]Mojig wrote:
Someone I know has knee problems and was telling me about it. He said that the doctors told him the muscles on the outside of his leg were too strong compared to his inner legs and it was pulling his kneecaps outward. The rotation resulted in some bad knee problems for him.

This sounded a little strange to me, especially since the doctor’s rehab didn’t really help him but going to a chiropractor did. Has anyone heard of problems like this? If so what exercises can you do to correct it or prevent it?[/quote]

Foam rolling the IT Bands will help loosen the pull on the patella; couple that with piriformis stretches and the knee pain should start to dissipate. Another thing is doing single leg squatting exercises such as Bulgarian Split Squats or even Single Leg Squats with a full range of motion. By taking the squats all the way to the bottom the Vastus Medialis Oblique (VMO) has a greater training stimulus and as a result should help to re-align the patella.