Knee Pain from Playing Soccer? Get some quick relief

Playing soccer giving you knee pain? Is it pain on the outside of your knee? Been there, done that, still dealing with that.

Why one gets lateral knee pain can come from a multitude of factors - could be one wrong step, excess body weight or fat, playing on rock solid shitty turf, faulty movement patterns, lack of hip internal rotation and/or crap ankle mobility (videos on that soon), too much of the same movement pattern, etc. and likely a combination of a few.

This article is not the complete solution to a complex problem, but a quick routine and some ideas that should bring your knees some relief. The goal here is to get you back on the field playing soccer pain free as soon as possible.

With lateral knee pain there is often tightness along that side of the body that seems to create compression forces in the knee leading to some grumpy menisici. I mean it was even proven in at least one scientific study by Bozkurt et al., 2004 called The Influence of Lateral Tightness on Lateral Knee Pain.

“In conclusion, there is a high correlation between lateral tightness and lat-eral knee pain. Lateral hamstring and/or iliotibial band tightness are predis-posing factors for lateral knee pain which have to be treated with manualtherapy and appropriate exercises. The possible relationships between lateraltightness, lateral knee pain and low back pain will be studied in a furtherclinical trial.
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In the video below, in addition to giving some relief and length to those tissues with rolling above and below the joint and creating space in the joint with gapping, we target the abductors with some strength work. However, while the stretches at the end hit upon the lateral hamstrings, I fail to include deep tissue work so here you go:

Here is a great seated version to hit the lateral hamstrings (biceps femoris):

In addition to relieving tightness, there is a reason for the tightness in the first place. In the case of lateral knee pain, it could be weak abductors. There are many exercises out there (yes like with mini bands) to train the abductors and external rotators and these are not the holy grail. But by lying down they are a good way to create a stable pelvis to really feel them work as a first step. Isolate ➡️ integrate. Ankle weights are welcome additions.