wide/narrow stance & knee pain

External Since: Jan 19, 2005 Posts: 38

Weird observation today. Narrow stance squat hurts my knee less than
wide - but the opposite is true for a deadlift. Why?

--Background - ACL tear 2 years ago (you can google it in this group),
ACL repair 1 year ago (Patella tendon graft).

The thing is, my knee pain is usually around the patella tendon (where
the graft was taken) - how is narrow stance easier on the patella
tendon with a squat?

Pain is different with deadlift, kind of a grinding from a (v. small)
bone chip left in the joint (can see it in an x-ray), ad that pai is
lesseed by the wide stance.

Just curiosity here.

Anyway, I'm still going sooper light on the squat - 155lbs. Deadlift
is just finally back to 3 plates (could do 4 at max, but I weighed
40bs more than now).

Squat is way harder.

Now that I that I've found I can do a narrow stance squat without
stressing the knee like the wide stace, I may (finally) be able to
relearn/retrain the squat - most I ever did there was about 275, I'd
be thrilled to get back to that, but it's gonna take time.

Oh, and don't complain about typos - the and a buttons are't working
very well.

External Since: Jan 08, 2005 Posts: 167

other people probably have much better advice than i'll give you, but
with the deadlift, i've read on here that the farther your forearms are
behind your knees when you begin your lift, the more strain it will put
on the knees. I guess that's kind of obvious though. But maybe the
wider stance has your forearms more behind your knees.