Bowlers lunges are killing my knees

CMmrsfloyd

I know what you're going to say, keep your knee over your ankle, don't let it go forward. But the thing is, THAT knee is not the problem. I'm very artful to keep that front/top knee perpendicular to the floor and not let it go forward. The problem is the back/bottom knee. I have the same issue during the lunge with core rotation. Actually the lunges that go straight forward bother that bottom knee more than the bowlers lunge. That back/bottom knee feels like the top part of my leg wants to disconnect from the bottom part of my leg and it gets sore/fatigued very very quickly on those exercises. I'm on week 3 and I don't know what I'm doing wrong. I never had any issues with that sort of pain/fatigue when I was doing various lunges in arouse Jillian Michaels DVDs (although they were very different, much faster movement and much lighter weights). I don't get it. I wouldn't think that holding larger weights for CLX would have anything to do with this problem but maybe I'm trying to use that back leg for too much support during the movement or something? Does anyone else have this problem or any suggestions?

becka63

Perhaps you are putting too much weight on the back knee for the bowler's lunge? My understanding is that that leg is down for balance and most of the weight should be on your front foot.

With the forward lunge, I find making sure I'm digging down into my front heel helps my back knee not to feel as though it's 'locking', which I'm not sure is what you're describing, or maybe experiment with the length of your stride for that lunge.

Hope that helps.

nehtaeh

I haven't started the program yet (trying to get over being sick first), however I do have Turbo Fire and Chalene does bowlers lunges in one of the tone/sculpt dvds. I just do a normal lunge. My right knee has hurt for some time (MRI shows its fine). I just can't do the bowlers lunges...I will try though, with focusing on the weight in the heel and see how that goes. If I can't do it without pain, I'll alter and do a normal lunge. While it may have some discomfort associated with it, normal lunges aren't painful to the point of uncomfortable for me.

Cclancaster

I agree with Becka maybe try to focus on all your weight being on the front heel this way there is very minimal weight on the back knee. It took me several weeks to get the hang of this and at first it felt weird but now I am doing great.

CMmrsfloyd

Thanks, I will definitely try to pay more attention to keeping my weight on that front heel.

becka63

I thought about this post when I was doing CLX burn 1 this morning and I was aware that even in a forward lunge, I have very little weight on my back knee, I tried to put weight on there to see what it was like and I could feel more pressure / strain on that back leg, that I could imagine if I was doing it like that all the time, could cause me problems.

CMmrsfloyd

I thought about this post when I was doing CLX burn 1 this morning and I was aware that even in a forward lunge, I have very little weight on my back knee, I tried to put weight on there to see what it was like and I could feel more pressure / strain on that back leg, that I could imagine if I was doing it like that all the time, could cause me problems.

Thanks for experimenting for me. :-). So that has got to be my problem, I need to be more aware of how I'm distributing my weight and not rely on that back leg for support.

CMmrsfloyd

Well, I have been trying really hard to pay attention to my alignment and keep my weight on the front leg, and things have been MUCH better! Yesterday I did my last Burn Circuit 3 and I felt the lunges in my butt but no issues in the knees whatsoever, so perfect! I'm using 20 lbs for the lower body exercises currently, I was afraid the issues meant I'd need to go lower on the weights but now I know the weight is fine, I just need to watch my form. I should be able to bump up that lower body weight soon. I'll be moving on to PUSH next week, can't wait!