On Preventing and Repairing Knee Pains

Off-Season Weight Training: Strengthen knees, quads and tendons before serious training by doing squats, bench step-ups, knee extensions, hamstring curls, stair climbing and recreational riding.

Start Easy: Strengthen tendons to handle high training loads by gradually ramping up with a periodized training plan or by following the age-old 10-percent rule: Don't increase workload duration or intensity by more than 10 percent a week. This is why it's important for racers to maintain an off-season base.

Avoid Sudden Hard Efforts and Impacts: Don't traumatize iffy tendons. Initially go easy on the hard srpinting and big-gear climbing. Off the bike, be cautious with hard leg presses, squats or jumping.

10-Minute Lube Job: Since knee's production of synovial fluid scales down in the off-season and slows down as you age, your knees will be under-lubed at the beginning of any ride, especially early season. Push it hard then you force the quads and tendons to work against friction, possibly risking some damage to the joint itself. An easy ten minute lower gears calmly primes capillaries to distribute blood through the muscles and lubricate the joints.

Stretch the Hamstrings: If the hamstrings are tight, the quads have to work harder to straigthen the leg on the downstroke, increasing stress on the tendons, So stretch before a ride. Also, stretch during and after the ride. which unlinks the legs by speeding the outflow of lactic acid and aids recovery.

Raise the Saddle: Riding too low cases you to flex the knee more and push the pedal at a less efficient angle, generating more stress and rubbing of the patellar tendon against the thighbone.