Kick sets for those with bad knees ...

Are the kick sets aggravating your knees?

Are the kick sets aggravating your knees? I haven't tried it in about a year, but I could feel the pain coming - the same kind of pain I get from running where I had to ice my knee afterwords. I can run twice a week for two months to complete a 5k for one triathlon but the pain and swelling becomes cumulative and I'm then done for 10 months. I don't want that to happen with swimming now that I have found it is my only true love. But my kick is real weak and it seems like an important aspect. How much would flippers help? I made the mistake of buying Zoomers last time I tried and that definately didn't help.

What type of kicking are you talking about: flutter, dolphin or frog? I have terrible knees -- they prevent me from running -- but have no trouble with kick sets. (Though I don't do frog kick at all in practice -- ever.) And I don't see how the nature of the stress on knees from swimming or kicking can be similar to the type of stress they get in running, to produce the same reaction. That being said, you need to listen to your body. Surely you can push it but stop or back off before you reach a tipping point, where you would be in pain for 10 months? If that's what you are doing and it isn't working, don't push on just because you've heard it is good for you. It isn't good for you if it makes you stop training. Flippers and zoomers are hard on my joints (knees and ankles) and I use them very sparingly.

The usefulness of kick sets depends on what your goals are. Competitive sprinters absolutely need to build their legs; and in full-stroke swimming it can be tempting to not work the kick in order to conserve energy. I normally restrict my breaststroke kicking to when I am doing full-stroke BR. Sometimes I just have to use a dolphin kick in practice instead and just work on the stroke rhythm. I rarely use BR kick during kick sets even when we are directed to do so. I just have too much damage to the knee from old injuries/surgeries and it is painful, the bad kind of pain. For the other strokes, kick sets don't seem to aggravate my knees much. I don't bend my knees much at all. On flipturns I have managed to torque and hurt my knee when my foot slipped on the wall. Current coaching says on freestyle turns, to push off the wall on your back but it may be more appropriate for bad-knee people to dip a shoulder on the flip so you aren't flat on your back and are already partly turned before you push off. SolarEnergy - is that a kneecap dislocation or a total dislocation of the knee itself (the kind where the ACL/PCL can be destroyed) ? Mine was the latter. I've found cycling to be excellent for building up the knees in a low-stress manner. Include "regular" cycling seated in the saddle, climbing hills slid back on the saddle and pushing with the heels down; riding standing on the pedals, and making sure you "paw back" and lift your feet on the upstroke rather than taking a free ride up so your hamstrings also get some work.

Anyone with loose knees would probably benefit from tightening them at the Gym. What exercises have you done and what are you planning to add? Thanks.

While kicksets are hard for me, they don't put any burden on my knees really. Only when I do a crappy *** stroke kick do my knees feel any sort of pain. Long tailed fins with help of course but it will be all the harder when you take them off or at least that's my opioion. You also have to remember that the power of a flutter kick doesn't come from the knees, it comes from the upper portion of your leg. I've come to realize that the flutter kick is a very hard kick to get down pat and takes time and practice.

Is there evidence to support that you are in fact better off avoiding kicking or am I just being a wuss? That's big reason why I quit competitive swimming way back, now I am resuming. The 3 things I found were pretty bad on knees (worst first) - Freestyle turns - Breaststroke kick - Flutter kick I mention freestyle turns because my knees hate unusual movements and sometimes just one flip with some twist in it could bring back the pain. The kicking would not hurt me at low speed. But back then, say you throw in a 10x100 free style kick hard off 2:00, would be a miracle to book it without being injured the day after. Now, the solution for me was hidden somewhere in the Gym. After several years of disciplined weight training (20min per session roughly, 2 leg exercises), I can flip, kick etc. The progress was monitored over 10 years. I can now conclude that without a weight resistance program, it would have been impossible to resume serious swimming. I am resuming competition this year, I expect my knees to complain about it a bit, I will increase my injury prevention gym workout by adding more exercises. - - - - Flippers would probably hurt you more. If you have a poor (weak) kick then huge chances are that you lack flexibility and that your ankles are tensed. This can be improved at very slow speed. A nice soft kicking drill (butterfly though, but helps for ankle flexibility etc) is this one here. It looks slow but I can easily hold a 1:15 interval for 50m kick sets while remaining very relaxing YouTube - Fly DrillSide Very relaxing for your knees, and kind of entertaining too.

I'm no expert, but like Frankie says, the power in flutter kick doesn't come from your knees, but from your thighs and your butt. You shouldn't be using your knees in flutter kick, and if flutter kick is straining them, you need to work on correcting your kick. It would probably be very good for you to do kick sets, and to focus on making your kick come from your bee-hind and upper legs instead of just trying to make your feet go up and down. The Butterfly kick is supposed to come from your hips, and I would think it would not strain your knees. I think it is fun and challenging to practice doing this kick properly. If I were in your shoes I wouldn't kick *** stroke at all.

Although it is of common belief that flutter kick power comes from the hip, in reality most power generated comes from quadriceps muscles during the extension of the leg. Just to make sure we talk about the same things here, my statement applies to sprint flutter kicking (which for me begins at a pace of 50sec per 50m). When a baseball player throws a ball, the motion is initiated by the whole body rotation weight transfer then the upper back then the shoulder then the arm then the wrist then the fingers. Same goes with flutter kick action. (hopefully) Initiated by the Hip (like you point out) then Huge quadriceps contribution to finish the leg extension and hopefully, if ankles are floppy enough they act like fins (flippers). In this equation, the knee kinds of act like a buffer, absorbing tremendous amount of energy which is the result of the flexing/extending action. The leg recovers fully straight (of course) then during the downsweep it flexes, then whip, then recover fully straight again etc. I take the time to detail all this because again, it is of common belief that swimming is a low impact activity especially for lower limbs. While this may be true if you don't intend to sprint, for me (as well as for the OP it seems) this belief is totally false. Anyone with loose knees would probably benefit from tightening them at the Gym.

What exercises have you done and what are you planning to add? Thanks. I believe that my knee issues were mostly related to a) muscle unbalance and b) loose articulation. Quads muscles being way to strong compared to back leg muscles. Of course, having dislocated my knees 3 times when I was in my teenage certainly did not help, explaining why the articulation became loose, thus unstable. Over the last 10 years, I have done mostly a modified leg press (well they call it H Sqat) which targets the glutes and back leg muscles more than Quads, I have systematically avoided Leg Extension and included Leg Curl (to create this balance between back leg and front leg strength). Between 2000 and 2008, I could not Squat. Very sharp pain underneath the knee pallet, like an electrical shock. Since 2009 I can (with very light weight). For season 2009-2010 I intend to modify my weight resistance menu in the following manner: - Increase Leg Curl number of sets and resistance, so that I can... - ... introduce the Leg Extension (flutter kick) without screwing up the balance (between back leg and front leg muscles) - Start adding more weight and sets for pure Squats (in preparation for breaststroke kicking) All this, I hope, will tighten up the knee articulation even more, allowing me (hopefully) to support repeated heavy kick and turns/push off the walls. You may have noticed that I did not do any (self) researches on hip abductors/adductors. I don't know if that would have help or not. Maybe for breaststroke kicking I don't know. Final note about breaststroke kicking. I am not fool. This is a highly dangerous exercise for me. I will actually kick breaststroke only when I really need it, otherwise I'll substitute fly kicking when doing the full stroke. This will be beneficial for my pulling anyway. If I manage to complete the full season without being seriously injured, next year I may add more Breaststroke kicking. In other words, I'll be very progressive in incorporating it. May I finish with an anecdote? Like you know, us, males, tend to compare each others when come to our ability to lift heavy weights. I have always been very weak compared to those big gym power lifter guys. Being 5'10 and weighting 150pounds, my top bench press performance doesn't exceed 1 plate and a half. Same goes with all other exercises except for two machines: Leg Extension and Lat Pulldown. And on the leg extension, back to the days I was training this, I could go up to 2 plates on each side (90pounds per leg) and manage sets of 12 like this. I have never seen any of these bodybuilders matching me at this. That outstanding ability came from years of hard free style kick sets during my childhood and teenage.