I am a 20 year old male. The past 1 or 2 weeks I’ve noticed slight pain, almost like an aching feeling in both of my knees when in a squat position. I have never been good at describing pain but its running from my lower thigh, then outside of the knee, then to the upper part of my calves. Its happening on both knees. My style of squating is feet about shoulder width apart with a slight outward angle of the toes which allows me to go as low as possible.
I should note that I do not notice the pain while training. It seems I only notice during normal bending down without lifting weights. Tommoro is my squat day and I’m going to check to see if its there while i lift as well.
I have recently started training much more intensly the past few months then over the summer and I have no plans on letting up. I may be over reacting but lifting is something I plan on doing for the rest of my life until I"m not longer able. Should this be of concern to me?
I’d put in some more hamstring work, like RDLs, pull throughs, glute-ham raises, ball leg curls, and whatnot. You want to make sure that the hamstrings and glutes are getting adequate stimulus for growth and strength increases as well.
Going with a lower bar position on the back, flat shoes, a wider stance, and an ass moving first will put less stress on the knees than a high bar, close stance squat, with heeled shoes that breaks at the knees first.
Make sure you keep your weight on your heels when you’re squatting. Failure to do this will cause knee problems. A lot of people lean forward onto their toes when they go into the hole.
Do you stretch a lot? When you squat regularly, you have to stretch your hamstrings, glutes, and hip flexors regularly. Foam rolling is also very important.
I try to hip break my squats but lately I have been noticing my knees going over my toes more. This week I am sorta taking it easy with the squats. I substituted yesterday with hang cleans and deadlifts along with the bench press as my main lifts.
Friday instead of more back squats im going to do barbell lunges.
Simplest easiest soft tissue work for you to do is probably self myofascial release (foam rolling/tennis ball rolling, etc.).
Hows tightness of inner/outer thighs, hip flexors, lower legs? Usually if squats are giving a client pain in their knees, its because there’s some kind of flexibility/strength imbalance and their knees aren’t tracking correctly or they’re not keeping their heels down.
Another thing to consider is footwear.
Also could be simple diet/training induced inflammation.
In highschool I had lower back pain problems due to tight hamstrings so i try to stretch regularly, even on non-training days. As far as my diet I eat clean.
Monday I’m going to start squating again and will more than likely be able to use my buddies camera to film a set for you guys to critique.