Struggling with knee pain

[Colin Grigson]

I find any knee pain alleviated by regular quad stretching … as you cycle more your quads will contract slightly over time putting strain on your knees causing pain … whenever I suffer this a stretching regime for a week or so usually cures it .. I’d be surprised if it‘s cleat related.
Hope you get it sorted

 

[Nebulous]

I developed sore knees in 2019 in the inside of my knees on particularly long rides - I was convinced it was going to become chronic and worried about it. I use SPD-SL pedals with yellow cleats.

A bike fit saw my saddle raised 14 mm and my cleats adjusted to be slightly toe-in. I had set the cleats up as straight before, and had not had any problems in 8 years or so.

This cured my knees, but I ended up with achilles pain instead. I put the saddle back down about 4mm and the achilles pain has largely gone.

I suppose my point is - everything is great while it works, but once it goes wrong small changes can make a difference, but can also shift the problem to somewhere else. These things are complicated and often end up with some compromises.

 

[Sharky]

I had extreme pain in one of my knees. I was late arriving at the start of an early season hilly event. Didn't have time to warm up or apply embrocation. Rode the event fine, but a few days later had chronic knee pains that lasted for ages.

So always keep your knees covered when cold and warm up before high intensity exercise..

 

[bencran]

Thanks again everyone. Since resetting my cleats I found that my left foot wanted to unclip inwards when pedalling, so needed a slight adjustment.

I rode a short 10 miles on Zwift earlier and everything felt ok, although it’s still not how it should be.

I’ve bitten the bullet and booked a fit in next month. I have RideLondon coming up next year and could do with being relatively comfortable for 6 or so hours in the saddle.

cheers again!

 

[CXRAndy]

I’ve bitten the bullet and booked a fit in next month. I have RideLondon coming up next year and could do with being relatively comfortable for 6 or so hours in the saddle.

You'd better be sorted. Riding 6 hours with discomfort will lead to long term strain injury

 

[newts]

I had right knee pain when when i first used spd-sl cleats, this was sorted during a bike/shoe fit session.
My right knee was dropping away to the outside during the revolution of the pedal (vertical laser line aimed through the pedal stroke), a small wedge corrected the tracking & the knee pain disappeared. It was suggested that the issue was caused by a tight hip/IT band weakness.

 

[Caperider]

My wife is a spin instructor and when she sets up a rider she has them sit on the bike put pedals at 3 and 9 oclock and your knee cap should be over your forward toe .if not she lowers or raised the saddle.she been teaching 17 years. It always seems to work out ok . And lidacaine 4% patches work well for knee pain and in the states they are over the counter .good luck . id loose the clips for a while and see how they feel .