Knee Strengthening Exercises: strength training for healthy knees

Posted by Martin Koban on Mar 23, 2012 in Articles, Functional Movement

If you’re a healthy individual, you can use the knee strengthening exercises on this page to do injury prehab, increase your lower body strength and improve your flexibility. The exercises will also make you a better athlete. If you have knee pain, the basic knee strengthening exercises will get you back on the path towards being pain-free, at which point you can progress to performing the more...

Train your buttocks to fix your knee pain

Posted by Martin Koban on Dec 18, 2011 in Functional Movement

At first glance the influence of the gluteal muscles on knee health is everything but obvious. However, if you scrutinize the function of the gluteals closely, there will be a big aha-moment. In short, the gluteus maximus and posterior fibers of the gluteus medius are responsible for producing hip external rotation and abduction (moving the leg to the outside as in side-lying leg raise). Both...

Limitations of stretching in fixing movement

Posted by Martin Koban on Dec 13, 2011 in Functional Movement

For most people stretching is the ultimate solution. You can fix tightness and thereby prevent injuries and pain, right? Well, sort of. Tightness in a muscle is just a result of previous behavior. Dr. Perry Nickelston points out that it is usually “a by-product of inefficient movement patterns where muscles unnecessarily have to compensate or work overtime to help you achieve the objective.”....