# Changed pedaling technique and my knee doesn't like it. Standing vs sitting when pedaling.



## Tall BMX'r (Jan 11, 2021)

This past month I've really been settling into how my bike handles after dialing my geo / fit in more. On a particular single track I ride a lot, I've been beating my previous times every time I ride it. It's a techie sidehill trail w/ quick 10ft to 15' ups and downs. Too quick to really shift or use my dropper. In the 2 miles of the trail I'd probably be shifting and dropping every few seconds. It's really fun. I found the perfect gear to ride it single speed, and just leave my seat dropped halfway. I've gotten comfortable enough to just stand and pedal like my old BMX days, tossing my bike side to side. My speed on this trail has almost doubled because of this pedaling technique. I've even been using it more on climbs. But, my old injured left knee has been swelling up because it. Just to confirm this was the case, I went for a ride just sitting as I pedal and used my dropper as needed. Even rode some steep downhills. No swelling. Kind a sucks. I was really feeling loose and fast with that stand up pedaling technique.
Anyone experience this issue or have preference of pedaling styles? Standing vs sitting? 

Here's what the trail looks like.


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## noosa2 (May 20, 2004)

_I like to mix it up. I’ll stand on short punchy climbs and stay seated for the majority of long steady climbs. If I stand a lot (e.g. single speed) I end up with tennis elbow. _


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## paramount3 (Jul 13, 2014)

If it hurts don't do it. Let the affected body parts rest. Then cautiously reintroduce the offending activity (vigorous out-of-the-saddle riding) but don't overdo it. At the moment, I am balancing occasional pain in my right knee, left foot, right Achilles tendon, left wrist, and left shoulder. And lower back. When one of those pains becomes limiting, I switch to a different bike, different style of riding, or different activity altogether (e.g. walk or hike instead of MTB). Remember when you were younger? You could just power through the pain? Well, you can still do that now--and then you'll be recovering and managing that pain for the next three months. Better to acknowledge the pain and back off before you're really f***ed.


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## Tall BMX'r (Jan 11, 2021)

paramount3 said:


> If it hurts don't do it. Let the affected body parts rest. Then cautiously reintroduce the offending activity (vigorous out-of-the-saddle riding) but don't overdo it. At the moment, I am balancing occasional pain in my right knee, left foot, right Achilles tendon, left wrist, and left shoulder. And lower back. When one of those pains becomes limiting, I switch to a different bike, different style of riding, or different activity altogether (e.g. walk or hike instead of MTB). Remember when you were younger? You could just power through the pain? Well, you can still do that now--and then you'll be recovering and managing that pain for the next three months. Better to acknowledge the pain and back off before you're really f***ed.


I've been distance stand up paddling in the harbor in the evenings. Great core workout and zero impact. I surf too. Walking long walks or hiking aggravates my knee, and I do not belong to a gym.


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## kosmo (Oct 27, 2004)

I stand less with every passing year, due to aging, arthritic knees. I'd rather sit and spin than ice my knees after a ride.

But I hear you on the speed. Some trails really reward a Savage Standing Approach!


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## VThuckster (Jul 10, 2010)

I used to have knee pain and my MD recommended strengthening core and other leg muscles. I think the surfing and paddle boarding has your core covered. I would suggest some straight leg deadlifts, sumo squats and cross leg lunges a few times a week. Biking tends to overdevelop outer quads, so you have do something to strengthen hamstrings, inner quads and stabilizing muscles. My guess is the swaying involved with standing and hammering has aggravated something because of some lateral movement or pressure. If that doesn’t work, your old injury may just necessitate limiting that type of movement.


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## drdre (Dec 15, 2005)

You might try stretching. Focus on hamstring, glutes, hips, and quads. Lots of videos out there. You never know what will help till you try it. Free! Also, consider flat pedals.


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## Nosdeho (Jun 16, 2021)

Tight cornering, tech climbs and descents, plus punchy climbs and descents I am standing. Over 40 so I stretch and do morning exercises and that has helped my core considerably. A stronger core helps not put all pressure on the knees and wrists.


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## FJSnoozer (Mar 3, 2015)

Tall BMX'r said:


> This past month I've really been settling into how my bike handles after dialing my geo / fit in more. On a particular single track I ride a lot, I've been beating my previous times every time I ride it. It's a techie sidehill trail w/ quick 10ft to 15' ups and downs. Too quick to really shift or use my dropper. In the 2 miles of the trail I'd probably be shifting and dropping every few seconds. It's really fun. I found the perfect gear to ride it single speed, and just leave my seat dropped halfway. I've gotten comfortable enough to just stand and pedal like my old BMX days, tossing my bike side to side. My speed on this trail has almost doubled because of this pedaling technique. I've even been using it more on climbs. But, my old injured left knee has been swelling up because it. Just to confirm this was the case, I went for a ride just sitting as I pedal and used my dropper as needed. Even rode some steep downhills. No swelling. Kind a sucks. I was really feeling loose and fast with that stand up pedaling technique.
> Anyone experience this issue or have preference of pedaling styles? Standing vs sitting?
> 
> Here's what the trail looks like.
> ...


Pedaling with your post half mast can cause significant strain and issues. 

My advice is to learn to ride the entire trail high posted. And stand when the trail demands. You don’t need a dropper dropped to ride those trails. And what you are trying to mitigate is the distraction and time lost in putting a dropper up and down over and over on those roller. 

I like you spend a significant amount of my time standing. The dropper only goes down in significant drops or situations where the post will ejevlct me from the bike  Sustained downhills with no sustained pedaling I will throw it down as well. 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## mlloyd007 (Dec 7, 2009)

100% same experience as you. When the pandemic started I deciced to get savagely fit, so I started riding my spin bike out of the saddle with relatively high resistance around a 60 cadence. After a few months my knees started to get irritated, and when I backed off standing and hammering so much the knee issue went away. All that constant pressure on my knees was clearly causal.


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## r-rocket (Jun 23, 2014)

Too much change too soon for your body to adjust to. Back everything off and work into it slower.

Ease up one gear, don't power through as hard, swing the bike less, only drop the seat half as much, and do half the trail sitting. Then build from there.

Don't wait for the swelling to manifest after the ride. Use your choice of compression as soon as the ride is over. 

Strengthen the knee with small muscle stability exercises, like a balance ball.


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## DennisT (Dec 29, 2019)

I was getting some knee pain if I SUP'd too much. Sitting pedalling never a problem. However, it wasn't an injury for me, just old age I think. In any case, I applied a cold pack after every ride and very gradually increased my SUP frequency. Eventually my knee adapted, and I no longer have the problem unless I _way _overdo it. I can tell if it's the last thing because _everything_ hurts.


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## Tall BMX'r (Jan 11, 2021)

drdre said:


> You might try stretching. Focus on hamstring, glutes, hips, and quads. Lots of videos out there. You never know what will help till you try it. Free! Also, consider flat pedals.


I stretch every day religiously. But I need to any some lateral stretching to my routine. I'm 6'7 and I can bend over an put my palms on the ground. I couldn't do that in my 20's:.
I'm already a flat pedal dude. The clipless pedals caused my knee to swell. I ditched them probably 8 years or so ago.


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## Tall BMX'r (Jan 11, 2021)

FJSnoozer said:


> Pedaling with your post half mast can cause significant strain and issues.
> 
> My advice is to learn to ride the entire trail high posted. And stand when the trail demands. You don’t need a dropper dropped to ride those trails. And what you are trying to mitigate is the distraction and time lost in putting a dropper up and down over and over on those roller.
> 
> ...


I agree. It definitely boils down to me just pushing my aging body to hard.


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## Sanchofula (Dec 30, 2007)

Sit and spin, I only stand for leverage or balance, using your weight to crank is not good for your joints and it's not as efficient.


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## jay_paradox (Oct 21, 2020)

Nurse Ben said:


> Sit and spin, I only stand for leverage or balance, using your weight to crank is not good for your joints and it's not as efficient.


This ^


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## J.B. Weld (Aug 13, 2012)

Nurse Ben said:


> Sit and spin, I only stand for leverage or balance, using your weight to crank is not good for your joints and it's not as efficient.



I know standing isn't usually quite as efficient but I hadn't heard about it being hard on your joints, I thought if anything maybe the opposite. Anyway I do it a lot and it's never bothered me but I realize that's anecdotal.


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## TylerVernon (Nov 10, 2019)

It sounds like you have knee stability issues. Do the knees over toes guy program and it will fix that.


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## ladljon (Nov 30, 2011)

I don't like standing, except just to stretch the legs for a second....sit and spin....of course I went from 170's to 135 mm crank arms, after riding for 30yrs smaller circle, less impact. NOT LESS LEVERAGE.


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## cvs (Jun 23, 2006)

if your going to stand and ride for extended periods you need an enormous amount of core/back strength and your legs need to be strong in the right way, they aren't the same muscles as your sitting spinning muscles. Plus you usually run much harder gears standing to maintain speed and are just mashing if your whole body isn't strong enough. I only single speed-ed for more then a decade(still do) and unless your strong enough you just come out killing yourself on those uphill runs. you need to be able to spin even when standing in harder gears for extended periods. otherwise you either feel it in your back or your knees(didn't matter what age i was,i'm 45 for reference.). but after conditioning for that i wouldn't feel the pain anymore. in the last couple years i switched to running a 11-28 or 11-25 ultegra cassette(which ever is in stock) on my mtb vs single speeding because i like to downhill, but my up hills are still similar to what you describe stand up and pedal get to the top; but you need core strength to feel light and able to spin, not mashing and heavy on your pedals/joints.


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## Jayem (Jul 16, 2005)

Mine was a damaged meniscus from an old injury. It would only make my knee swell after about 100miles, but for endurance stuff, it was exactly like you say, the more I climbed out of the saddle, the worse it got. Got arthroscopic surgery a few months ago to address it.


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## Tall BMX'r (Jan 11, 2021)

Standing on my pedals and climbing is second nature to me. I raced BMX and grew up in a hilly neighborhood. I had a paper route that was all hills. Rode my single speed Schwinn StingRay with my delivery bags on the handlebars full of news papers up and down hills every day delivering papers. We had a single track we built from a water tower on a hill 500 feet above our house. We'd all ride up that steep hill standing on our pedals grinding it out to the top. Amazing jumps all the way down. When I was a older and had grown out of BMX (literally I'm 6'7) I got into road bikes and racing. I was old school toe-clipped in and I never stood even climbing hills. I was a ski instructor too so my legs were pretty strong. Years later when mountain bikes became a thing, I road with clipless pedals. I quit riding because my knee (left knee) started to swell up when I rode. One year I decided to give the riding another go while on a trip to Lake Tahoe, but had I left my clipless shoes at home by accident. So I bought some flat pedals to ride. No swollen knee. Rode every day with out a problem. 
About a year ago I really started getting back into mtb'g. I bought a Hightower and it was like my old motocross and BMX days had returned. I started with the bigger and bigger jumps, then a big crash. "Wake up old man, you're almost 60..." An eye opening realization. So no more big jumps, but lots of speed. Dialing in each trail and getting faster on them. The stand and climb on the trails with quick transitions just felt natural and helped me keep my speed up. In those situations, sitting and spinning is slower. The bottom line is, the standing and pedaling is torqueing my knee and aggravating it. I'll have to tame down the attack mode and just enjoy the flow.


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## Tall BMX'r (Jan 11, 2021)

Jayem said:


> Mine was a damaged meniscus from an old injury. It would only make my knee swell after about 100miles, but for endurance stuff, it was exactly like you say, the more I climbed out of the saddle, the worse it got. Got arthroscopic surgery a few months ago to address it.


I'm headed that way probably sooner than later. It's affecting my skiing as well, and I just bought some new skis! I also bought a good hinged knee brace for skiing.


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## Offspring (Jan 29, 2006)

Interesting discussion. I didn't grow up with bmx, dirt jumpers etc, but rode quite a bit of road stuff, so I'm a sit and pedal guy, with an occasional 1-minute out of the seat at the top to clear it. I've been a sit and pedal guy so long that I found for me, a dropper post was useless and just added weight and made the handlebar even busier. I've always found standing downhill in the rough was okay with the seat in a fixed position. Since going to flats a long time ago any joint pain I had disappeared also.


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## TooTallUK (Jul 5, 2005)

Do you want to do what you do like you used to do it, or do you want to do what you do for as long as possible? 
I used to be a masher, had to learn to be a spinner. I got my competitive nature out of me as a rugby player before that sport permanently damaged me, so I appreciate where your need for speed comes from. I amended most of what I do for the long game. Trekking poles for hiking, bikes for exploring and fun, not racing. Good on you for pushing it hard but listen to the parts of your body that are expensive to fix!


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## Calsun (May 12, 2021)

Sitting puts your weight on the saddle and somewhat on the handlebars and so is much easier on the knees. I stand so as to stretch my leg muscles and to be able to straighten my neck and relax my shoulders for a bit. If you need to stand then you need lower gears and probably best to go with a smaller chainring. 

My hardtail has a 32T chainring and my FS bike has a 30T chainring and have 10-51 and 11-50 cassettes. On the pavement I use a 14-28 freewheel and 46/52 chainrings so no comparision with the gearing for the mountain bikes with their much heavier frames and tires.


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## Tall BMX'r (Jan 11, 2021)

I've been stretching my knee longer than usual and rode 7 miles (1,000 ft elev) yesterday using my dropper and down shifting for the most part. Even a few hike-a-bike on some 'too steep' ups. No swelling today Knee feels good. I was focusing on more linear pedaling. That is easy for me being a past road biker who's used to always focusing on the line.


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## JACKL (Sep 18, 2011)

paramount3 said:


> If it hurts don't do it....Better to acknowledge the pain and back off before you're really f***ed.


Well put. I had a bad knee for years, had to stop running. Over time pushing a tall gear seemed to make my knee pain disappear - much to my surprise. But at the first twinge of knee pain, I _always_ backed off. Burning legs is one thing, but when a tendon or ligament is talking, pushing through the pain is not going to benefit you.


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## Velobike (Jun 23, 2007)

JACKL said:


> ...Over time pushing a tall gear seemed to make my knee pain disappear - much to my surprise. But at the first twinge of knee pain, I _always_ backed off. Burning legs is one thing, but when a tendon or ligament is talking, pushing through the pain is not going to benefit you.


That is the essence of riding singlespeed. My daughter was having problems with her knees because of her Highland dancing.
Her physio encouraged her to keep riding singlespeed because he believed it was a beneficial non impact exercise that strengthened the supporting structure of the knee.

Burning legs, burning lungs, good. 
Macho trying to stay on the bike when it would be quicker pushing, dumb.


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## Tall BMX'r (Jan 11, 2021)

Velobike said:


> That is the essence of riding singlespeed. My daughter was having problems with her knees because of her Highland dancing.
> Her physio encouraged her to keep riding singlespeed because he believed it was a beneficial non impact exercise that strengthened the supporting structure of the knee.
> 
> Burning legs, burning lungs, good.
> Macho trying to stay on the bike when it would be quicker pushing, dumb.


Strava made me do it.


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## Calsun (May 12, 2021)

Knee pain results from either improper seat height (usually too low) or using too high a gear. Overall, bicycling is the best exercise one can do for their knees which is why the US ski team trains on bicycles during the summer months. 

Cadence meters are a good accessory piece of gear for novice riders. Pro racers will be at 90 RPMs or faster and newbies will be at less than 60 RPM's and often at less than 40 RPMs.


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## Tall BMX'r (Jan 11, 2021)

Calsun said:


> Knee pain results from either improper seat height (usually too low) or using too high a gear. Overall, bicycling is the best exercise one can do for their knees which is why the US ski team trains on bicycles during the summer months.
> 
> Cadence meters are a good accessory piece of gear for novice riders. Pro racers will be at 90 RPMs or faster and newbies will be at less than 60 RPM's and often at less than 40 RPMs.


I agree that cycling is the best exercise for the knees. I was a ski instructor and junior racer (Far West) and I cycled (road biked) even in the winter... in the mountains. Enduro riding has terrain that changes in seconds continually, making a cadence nearly impossible. My dropper is going up and down every 10' or 20' as well as shifting for quick ups that you don't see coming around a tight turn. It's like bump skiing through messed up moguls and trying to find a rhythm. That's probably what did my knees in in the first place


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## BansheeRune (Nov 27, 2011)

Tall BMX'r said:


> This past month I've really been settling into how my bike handles after dialing my geo / fit in more. On a particular single track I ride a lot, I've been beating my previous times every time I ride it. It's a techie sidehill trail w/ quick 10ft to 15' ups and downs. Too quick to really shift or use my dropper. In the 2 miles of the trail I'd probably be shifting and dropping every few seconds. It's really fun. I found the perfect gear to ride it single speed, and just leave my seat dropped halfway. I've gotten comfortable enough to just stand and pedal like my old BMX days, tossing my bike side to side. My speed on this trail has almost doubled because of this pedaling technique. I've even been using it more on climbs. But, my old injured left knee has been swelling up because it. Just to confirm this was the case, I went for a ride just sitting as I pedal and used my dropper as needed. Even rode some steep downhills. No swelling. Kind a sucks. I was really feeling loose and fast with that stand up pedaling technique.
> Anyone experience this issue or have preference of pedaling styles? Standing vs sitting?
> 
> Here's what the trail looks like.
> ...


That looks similar to some of my haunts...

On the knee issue...
How much time are we standing vs. saddled?
I have two knees that are shot and have been for more than 30 years! 

What seat height are you using on this trail?
Can you tweak your position/stance while standing, pedaling?

One reason I cannot deal with steep STA's is that it pisses my knees off to the point that it requires an ER visit and a morphine injection! My typical seat height, I have a bike as opposed to a horse! is around 80-85% leg extension to provide room to move and function. Many years of sorting out position in terms of standup pedal as well as riding 80-85% extension has set muscle memory to those areas. 
Unless I deviate from that or over exert on a ride, I do rather well.


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## Calsun (May 12, 2021)

I was talking to a very experienced coach and for his own riding he has the dropper either at 25% up or 50% up most of the time depending on the terrain. It is never all the way up or all the way down when he rides. Actually all the way down when stopped so he can plant his legs on the ground more easily.


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## Tall BMX'r (Jan 11, 2021)

Paying more attention to my pedaling and seat height, I've found a good pattern that has been working fine. I'm listening to my knees now. They actually talk to me all the time. When they say ouch, I make an adjustment to quiet them down The only time I ride with my dropper in the full up position, is on a steep, long climb. Average trail / fire roads I'll drop it 25% ish. More techie trails with quick ups and downs, I'll be actively raising and dropping accordingly. With steep downhills that have almost vertical drops and jumps, my seat is all the way down and my butt is over the back wheel.
Rarely am I standing and pedaling anymore. I rode 10 miles with 1,200 elev gain of single track today. Knees are good right now.


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## BansheeRune (Nov 27, 2011)

Tall BMX'r said:


> Paying more attention to my pedaling and seat height, I've found a good pattern that has been working fine. I'm listening to my knees now. They actually talk to me all the time. When they say ouch, I make an adjustment to quiet them down The only time I ride with my dropper in the full up position, is on a steep, long climb. Average trail / fire roads I'll drop it 25% ish. More techie trails with quick ups and downs, I'll be actively raising and dropping accordingly. With steep downhills that have almost vertical drops and jumps, my seat is all the way down and my butt is over the back wheel.
> Rarely am I standing and pedaling anymore. I rode 10 miles with 1,200 elev gain of single track today. Knees are good right now.


You are doing that right!


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