Dodgy Knee

[Pedalo]

Over the last few days I seem to have pulled a muscle or somehow strained one of my knees. It seems fine for standing, walking or sitting but hurts like hell when cycling or kneeling down, or when I stand up or sit down.

It's useful that with the electric bike I can take most of the strain off it when cycling but even then it still hurts a quite a bit.

In these circumstances is it best to stop cycling all together for a few days until it's recovered or just carry on and hope it goes away?

 

[flecc]

I generally prefer to exercise through injuries, but there are factors with knees which prompt me to advise checking with your doctor as a precaution. He will articulate your knee and with feel and experience will be able to tell if any arthritis is present or possibly particles loose in the joint. Anti-inflammatories like Ibuprofen in tablet form or as ointments often help such conditions and your doctor may recommend that or a similar drug to help you exercise through the pain.
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[Pedalo]

Thanks for the advice Flecc, I'm sure you're right to advise precaution. The pain seems even worse over the last couple of days so I'm going to take a break from the cycling for a few days to see if it improves. Frustrating because the weather is great...

I generally prefer to exercise through injuries, but there are factors with knees which prompt me to advise checking with your doctor as a precaution. He will articulate your knee and with feel and experience will be able to tell if any arthritis is present or possibly particles loose in the joint. Anti-inflammatories like Ibuprofen in tablet form or as ointments often help such conditions and your doctor may recommend that or a similar drug to help you exercise through the pain.
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[Bikerbob]

I hope your knee problem is better by now. In my (sadly considerable) experience of bad knees I find that if there is a 'flare up' the best thing is to rest them as much as possible and take anti-inflammatory tablets until the problem dies down. The anti-inflammatory ointments have never worked for me.

 

[Pedalo]

Thanks Bob,

I've not cycled for a couple of weeks and it's much better though I still feel the odd twinge. I'll try cycling again next week and see how it goes. I have been missing it especially with all this nice weather.

I'll make good use of motor power for quite a while until I'm sure it's better. To me that's the great thing about these electric bikes - you can take it as easy or as hard as you like.