Knee Noise?
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When I began my knees over toes experiments, I was afraid to train when anyone else was near me in the gym, because my knees made such loud noises…
After 10 straight years of knee pain and 3 surgical alterations, a LOT of damage had been done prior to my knees over toes journey.
Yet here I stand, with world-class knees. And they are WAY less noisy than they once were. But no, even my knees are not completely noiseless… YET!
In writing this article, I watched a lot of my recent videos and CRANKED the volume up to see if I could hear any noise from my knees. I then compared recent footage to footage from a year ago and my knees are even quieter now than they were then! So clearly, whatever knee noise I do have left keeps getting less and less and less each year…
When I sucked at all the Knee Ability exercises, my knees were SUPER noisy on any knee movement — even reverse step ups, which are now 100% noiseless at all times. So we can definitely come to the conclusion that…
GREATER PROTECTION = LESS NOISE.
And when I started ATG Split Squats years ago they were super loud (!!), but now I never hear anything when I do them. So this movement alone went through a full cycle from heavy noise, to mild noise, to no noise (at least in terms of what is detectable by the human ear).
I’ve observed this same cycle with hundreds of athletes I trained in person. Some knees were so loud we had to crank up the music! But from week to week, we could hear the noise get less and less. In many cases I would quite literally sit in a squat, keeping my ear close to the athlete’s knee to listen to the noise and compare from week to week. Less noise became an expected part of the Knee Ability process.
It’s pretty darn awesome that ROKP + the Knee Ability progression from Zero to Dense to Standards provides a route to REVERSE knee noise, even though knee noise becomes mathematically more present in people as they age and as they encounter knee pain!
Scientifically-speaking: WE ARE ALTERING HUMAN LONGEVITY!
Now let’s look at this science…
Unfortunately, if you Google “knee noise” you get a variety of responses like this:
“The first line of treatment for this condition includes rest, ice, compression, and elevation, or ‘RICE.’ Anti-inflammatory medication and physical therapy exercises can also relieve it. If these do not help, splinting, surgery, or both may be necessary.”
YIKES, especially considering the very guy who coined the “RICE” formula in 1978, Dr. Gabe Merkin, has now changed his mind, and says that these things may actually DELAY healing, instead of helping. Yes, the very guy who coined “RICE” has taken it back!!! I even wrote this article going into greater detail on this disastrous situation which Google and the majority of the world are unaware of.
Now let’s look at a quote from a study: [cited with link at end of article]
“Individuals with crepitus (the medical term for knee noise) had lower self-reported function, quality of life and higher pain compared to those without crepitus.” HOWEVER… “the presence of knee crepitus is not associated with objective function or knee strength.”
Wow!
What this is saying is: people with knee noise are more likely to be suffering from pain or reduced activites, BUT the noise itself does not have evidence for your knees actually being less functional!
To me, this means that so many people who are suffering from knee pain and even depression due to that pain, ARE A STONE’S THROW AWAY FROM BETTER KNEE QUALITY OF LIFE.
When you look up: “What is knee crepitus?” the answer begins with: “When the pressure between the kneecap and the femur (thigh bone) is greater than usual…”
Ok, so basically when your knee has too much pressure on it, it can get this condition. That can happen from being in intense sports, intense lifting, from losing muscle after injury, from being immobilized, etc., etc. etc.
There are so many reasons this could have come about, and yet all you have to do to reverse it, is strengthen the things in your body which ALSO handle knee pressure (HELLOOOO Knee Ability!).
This could account for why so many people start the Knee Ability Program and get shocking wins from the very first week, or even from the very first session!
So many people are so close to better knees, but they just don’t realize it because their knee noise scares them!
This is also why, for the people who really do have a low level of function, a longer journey may be ahead.
Let me see if I can clarify all this for you:
Knee “pain” is a game of MATH, so let’s use some arbitrary numbers, and say that “Bob” has knees with a strength rating of 60 out of 100. Now let’s say Bob’s sport, or lifting, or even a momentary fall, requires a 61. This may result in Bob having knee pain!
But this does not mean Bob has “BAD” knees. It merely means that the demands of life exceeded Bob’s ability to withstand the pressure.
And so, through accident, or repeated pressures, any human body can get knee pain. If I jumped off a building, it would hurt. Well, a one-story building actually wouldn’t hurt ;) — but if we went high enough, it’s only a math equation until my knees would physically break, and it’s only a math equation continuing up from there until we reach a height that any human body would die… all from the same activity: landing — that I have to withstand every time I play basketball. It’s just math.
Unfortunately, when Bob experiences that 61 knee pressure, which exceeds his 60 of protection, he is often sent home to rest, ice, take painkillers, etc., after which he now winds up dropping down to a 54 of protection (due to 2 months of inactivity). But because the 61 is no longer present, he may feel he has healed! And he may have healed from the 61. But now when the 61 happens again, and he’s only at a 54, he tears his ACL.
Bob has surgery, and follows exactly what he’s told. But rehab sends him back out into the world as only a 42 now. So he wears a knee brace that’s a 7. So he’s a 49 in total. But he likes to run. And running is a 53. When he used to be a 60, running didn’t hurt.
So now he’s stunned and depressed when he finds that running hurts, and he’s going to all sorts of body workers, taking all kinds of supplements, just to get an extra 1 or 2! And on some days after the perfect massage he is a 53, and he runs and feels great. But he tries to do it the next day, hasn’t recovered yet, and doesn’t realize he’s only at a 48. BOOM! Now he causes even more damage, and life continues to go downhill, resulting in full knee replacement and giving up the joys of playing with his kids.
This was my life for 10 years.
$10,000+ in surgery costs.
MORE THAN $10,000+ on every possible way of getting that extra 1 or 2.
So I feel for every Bob out there, because I was Bob.
All Bob was missing was a system of Knee Ability. And he was SO close to being okay, but never realized it!
Conclusion: knee noise CAN reduce or disappear, but does NOT mean you have bad knees! Bonus: you are never exempt from the math of the situation, so make sure you get that math on your side!!!
Yours in Bulletproofing,
The Athlete Formerly Known as Bob
To follow my full route from Knee Ability ZERO to DENSE STRENGTH to STANDARDS, which has produced 1882 knee success stories and requires ZERO equipment for your first 12 weeks (but you are free to progress at ANY time), check out atgonlinecoaching.com and use code FRESHSTART2021 for my lowest price ever!
And to see the equipment you would need, by program: https://kneesovertoesguy.medium.com/equipment-by-program-5a50fc84f9ac
