059. Understanding Knee Alignment and The Proper Mechanics for Long-Term Knee Support

02 Mar 059. Understanding Knee Alignment and The Proper Mechanics for Long-Term Knee Support

In this episode, Andrew takes a deep dive into the subject of proper knee alignment and the importance of taking care of your knees throughout your life. This episode is for anyone, no matter how active or inactive your lifestyle is! Throughout each day, the majority of our activities involve weight-bearing movements that affect our knees. This includes walking, going up and down the stairs, squatting, jumping, running, etc. Having proper knee alignment is one of the big things we all need to focus on for injury prevention and knee health down the line.

This episode covers the details about what exactly affects the alignment of our knees. It doesn’t start and stop at the knees. Everything is connected, and there are so many variables that affect the knees. Our knees are impacted, not just by our movement, but these other factors as well:

-Foot placement
-Ankle mobility
-Hip alignment
-Hip and core strength/stability
-Hip and core mobility

When it comes to movement, our knees are only supposed to move in a hinged fashion. In other words, our knees are not supposed to move in multiple planes. This is when injuries and wear and tear on the knees start occurring. If you do not have proper knee alignment, it creates the risk for these injuries:

-Sprains
-Wear and tear on the knee joint itself
-Tears in ligaments, such as the ACL, MCL, and LCL
-Patellofemoral injuries

Listen in on this episode as Andrew shares his in-depth knowledge on how to properly care for the knees and avoid any injuries or issues in the future. The knowledge shared in this episode will help you learn how to bulletproof your knees and give you insight into the ways that all of our parts are deeply connected.

This episode is complimentary to episode 8, which is all about how to improve your squat techniques. To revisit episode 8, click here.