Half the people who message me about starting have a knee. A dodgy one from football, a stiff one from a desk, one that clicks on the stairs. Almost none of them need to stop training. Most of them need to train differently for a few weeks, and the knee usually gets better for it.
First, the line I do not cross: if a knee is swollen, hot, locking, giving way, or hurt in one clear moment and has not settled in a week, that is your GP or a physio before it is me. I coach; I do not diagnose. How the return works once you are cleared.
Section
What gets swapped
- Jumping. Box jumps and burpees become step-ups and a fast march. Same heart rate, none of the landing.
- Deep squats under load. Squat to a box at a height that does not hurt, and the box gets lower as the weeks go on. A squat that stops above the pain is still a squat.
- Lunges. Reverse lunges instead of forward ones. Stepping back loads the hip more than the knee, and most sore knees prefer it.
- Running. Rower, bike or sled instead. The sled is the best friend a sore knee has: it loads the legs hard with no impact.
What stays
Everything above the waist. Hinges and deadlifts, usually, because a well-done hinge barely troubles a knee. Carries, presses, rows, core work. Nobody with a sore knee has ever needed to skip an upper-body session, and the training keeps you in the habit while the knee catches up.
The three things that usually help
- Stronger glutes and hamstrings. Most knees hurt because the muscles either side of them are not doing their share. Bridges, hip thrusts, Romanian deadlifts, three times a week, light and slow to start.
- Full range, no weight. A few slow bodyweight squats to a chair every day, as far as is comfortable. Knees like movement more than they like rest; they just do not like being surprised.
- Losing a bit of weight if there is a bit to lose. Every kilo off is several kilos less through the knee on every stair. The 8-Week Package does this without a single jump if that is what the knee needs.
What I say at the door
Tell me before the warm-up, not after the first set. I will give you the swap for anything that hurts, quietly, and nobody else in the gym needs to know. Pain that goes above a three out of ten, or that is still there the next morning, means we scale it back further. Sore is fine. Sharp is not.
Every session is coached and every session can be changed for one knee. Message me on WhatsApp before your first one and tell me about it.