I've been noodling on this for a while now.

Why do some knee niggles and running injuries linger worse than the full-blown flu?

Especially when you're:

• gradually increasing mileage and balancing it with intensity
• strength training regularly 2-3x a week
• making sure you're eating and sleeping

Usually that's the point where runners (myself included!) can get side tracked with "maybe I need a different shoe" or "maybe something is off with my running form"...

And it could be! *it could*.

But the biggest problem I see, is assuming a NEW SHOE will fix all our problems. (I'm raising my hand, too, don't worry.)

When in reality, we're missing the HUGE physiological puzzle piece.

And we don't even know it.

In the past couple, months I'd gone down the running-injury-continuing-education rabbit hole, learning and updating everything I know about running injuries.

And I noticed a pattern. A LOT of our knee pain can be the result of not-so-strong knee tendons. Yes, we need strong quads, glutes, hammies, all the things, all the places.

But running is a high impact sport. And consistent heavy lifting 100% helps us run stronger, faster, more efficiently. But we completely forget (or just don't know about) training and strengthening our tendons.

Let me give you two quick examples:

• lifting heavy helps build stronger muscles. Lifting and SLOWLY helps build strong tendons. think 3 secs to get down into your squat, 3 secs to come out of it
• Plyometrics are form of strength training (albeit intense) and it directly encourages physiological adaptation in how the collagen fibers are laid down within the tendon, making it stronger.

So if you're putting the puzzle pieces together, you're starting see that consistent strength training like a runner with exercises that help you build the exact strength you need, is STILL SUPER IMPORTANT.

But, if you have a stubborn knee like me that likes to throw the occasional tantrum, then we need to add a little spice in the form of plyometrics.

So that's why with this week's blog post I wanted to hone in specifically on what I would do as a physical therapist for a runner who came to me with repeat runner's knee and they just can't seem to get it to go away.

These are the exercise I would gradually work them into. And now you can play around with them on your own.

Because please, don't be scared off from jumping. Think of the plyos as playing.

I've deliberately chosen all of them to look like running and address very specific moments that occur within your running stride.

So while it all sounds very serious and scientific and white-lab-coat-ish...

It's still just practice. Trust me, filming plyo videos like these always humble me because I see how much I have to work on. ;)

Go check these super-knee strengthening plyo exercises here:

Dare to Train Differently,

Marie Whitt, PT, DPT //@dr.whitt.fit

P.S. Feel like your runner's knee is always just lurking beneath the surface? More goblet squats are NOT gonna fix that guy. These will ;)

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