Will Running Ruin Your Knees?
It seems like whenever I mention that I am a runner, there is a good chance that someone is going to warn me that I will break my knees. While the belief that running will destroy your knees is widespread, there is not much evidence to support this claim.
“You’re not going to stick your knees up,” said Cordelia Carter , a sports orthopedic surgeon at New York University in Langone.
On the contrary, there is actually a lot of evidence that running has a protective effect on the knees – another benefit, along with all the other benefits of regular exercise.
However, there is no magic bullet that will protect you from exercise-induced injuries. While jogging is beneficial for many people, it is important to be mindful of injury prevention and be aware of your body’s strengths and weaknesses. “Some people are naturally built to run injury-free with less effort than others,” Carter said.
So what do we know about the effects of knee running?
Runners have lower rates of knee arthritis
The first sign that running may not be as harmful as we once thought is the fact that if you compare runners versus non-runners, the former are statistically less likely to develop arthritis in the knees. In a study that compared runners and non-runners for 20 years , x-rays showed signs of arthritis in the knees in 20% of runners and 32% of non-runners. The counter-argument is that runners who develop knee injuries will stop running and therefore be considered non-runners, but another study that involved 2,000 people over the course of several years also found that both current and former runners runners are less likely to develop knee arthritis. …
If people stopped running because of knee pain, we would see higher rates of arthritis in the knees of former runners, not lower incidences of the disease.
Running can strengthen the cartilage in the knees
Recent evidence suggests that the protective effect of running may be related to the strengthening of the cartilage in our knees . It used to be thought that cartilage had only a limited ability to heal itself, with repeated exposure to running depleting it, leading to arthritis. However, in animal studies, running animals have thicker cartilage than non-running animals.
In a study published last year , researchers examined whether this could apply to humans as well. To do this, they used data tracking the force generated in the knee while running to create a simulation showing the potential impact on cartilage.
The simulations compared two scenarios: what would happen if the cartilage had limited self-healing ability, and what would happen if it had a slightly more reliable self-healing ability. The results show that if cartilage had limited ability to repair, we would see arthritis develop in the knees of almost all runners, as well as a significant number of people who walk daily. However, this is not what we see in arthritis statistics. Instead, the real incidence of arthritis is consistent with a scenario where cartilage has robust repair capacity.
Runners can still develop knee pain if they don’t exercise properly
While there is ample evidence that running is good for knees, this does not mean that a runner has zero risk of developing knee problems. Runner’s knee is a common condition that often requires physical therapy and training adjustments. As Carter says, if all you do is run, and you run every single day, the chances are high that you will get injured.
A runner’s knee can develop due to a number of problems, be it muscle imbalance, a problem with gait, or increasing mileage too quickly. This is why it is important to exercise caution when it comes to increasing the intensity of your workouts. It’s also important to make sure your shoes are comfortable and that you change them when they wear out.
When a runner’s knee is due to muscle imbalance, physical therapy is often the solution. Typically, the muscles that cause imbalance include the core muscles, as well as the thigh and pelvic muscles. “The treatment is to balance muscle groups and target those that are underutilized,” Carter said. “Runners use some muscle groups really well and then ignore others.”
Include cross-training and strengthening exercises
Avoiding muscle imbalance that leads to knee pain requires a holistic training approach . This includes incorporating various exercises, such as strength training, as well as various forms of cardio, with adequate rest and recovery time, and slowly building up mileage or intensity.
Carter loves to recommend yoga, which works the core muscles and also includes rotational movements that are not available during running, which can help prevent injury. “I use yoga almost like a home physical therapy regimen because of the strengthening exercise,” Carter said.