Deadlifts and knees....

Has anyone here found that doing deadlifts helps with bad knees?. I have found mine have greatly improved with the conventional deadlift - Sumo seems to make them worse tho. Also does anyone here know if glucosamine is worth taking for knee problems?.

cheers,

Given that they strength your legs and also encourage at least some flexibility in the hamstrings, it makes sense that, for some people, conventional deadlifts would help the knees track better.

Again, just your particular build and the way the lift works it. If you want to do sumo, I'd experiment with the angle at which you place your feet. You may finding turning them in or out more will take care of the knee problem but, then again, you may just not get along with sumo. The idea for just about every lift (and, for that matter, every stretch) is to keep the knees tracking in line with the feet. If the knees don't track the feet, most people will have problems once the weight gets heavy enough.

It seems to help some people. I think it depends on what your problems are. I take it on and off and it doesn't seem to do a blessed thing for me.

Cycling seems to be pretty good for the knees. It has no impact. Set the seat height so you can't quite straighten the legs out. I don't know about a ski machine. That seems OK too.

Also, make sure to do light warm up sets on deadlifts before your work sets. The back needs warming up. I like to do a couple of light squat sets before my deadlift warm up sets.

Jeff out ...

Rowing puts the knees through a greater range of motion than cycling or ski machine. I picked up a nice rowing machine for about $60 at a used sporting goods store; it is a decent cardio workout.

If cycling, make sure that the seat height is set correctly.