Northern California - Knee pain - will cycling exacerbate the injury?

I have tendonitis on my knee. It just started last week and haven't had a chance to see my MD yet but I'm pretty sure it's just that. Anyway, I often hear that cycling is actually a good exercise for knee injuries. Is ther any truth to that or should I avoid it? I'm trying to stay off my feet for now, taking 600 mg ibuprofen and icing my knee. I was on the trainer yesterday and the knee felt great afterwards but this morning it hurts.

Got on the trainer again today. Felt knee pain below 92 rpm then nothing above 95. Going to ice it now, just in case.

Personally when I moved to San Francisco in 83 I had a serious gimp from a 2 year old catastrophic knee injury. I took a job as a bike messenger, then started club riding, racing and century riding. I lost the gimp after 6 months and now it only hurts when I stop riding for awhile...like taking a couple of weeks off. I guess it has a lot to do with blood circulation and keeping a joint moving often.

I have tendonitis on my knee. It just started last week and haven't had a chance to see my MD yet but I'm pretty sure it's just that. Anyway, I often hear that cycling is actually a good exercise for knee injuries. Is ther any truth to that or should I avoid it? I'm trying to stay off my feet for now, taking 600 mg ibuprofen and icing my knee. I was on the trainer yesterday and the knee felt great afterwards but this morning it hurts.

Where is the pain? If it is right behind the kneecap (meaning at the front of the knee), it is likely chondromalachia (sp?). The two most likely culprits of chondro are: (1) seat too low; and (2) pushing too big a gear too often.

Yes, cycling is generally very knee friendly, but riding with the seat too low or grinding instead of spinning can be harmful.

If your knee is hurting somewhere else, I'm out of my depth, except to pass on the received wisdom that the Old Guard passed on to us young punks back in the mid-1970's - if your knee hurts in the front, raise the seat, if it hurts in the back, lower the seat.

Good luck. Having to be off the bike sucks.

I've been experiencing pain and am thinking about dropping my seat. I noticed that my hips have been rolling a bit during hard climbing, and was wondering if my seat is too high and causing knee pain (the patellar tendon is displeased because my patella doesnt track right due to a congential anomaly in the lower part of my knee) more than usual.

Sorry guys I should've been more clear. The knee pain is from running, not cycling. Been training to run a 5k race in April or May. My first foot race in 24 years. My body ain't what it used to be. Knee hurts just climbing up stairs. The pain is below the knee cap in front. Low cadence, more resistance aggravates it so I'm sticking to 95 rpm and above until the pain goes away. I won't be running for a while that's for sure but I want to keep cycling even if just on the trainer. Have to keep the blood sugar down.

rub some dirt on it

My experience with tendonitis is that you have to stop doing whatever you're doing until it goes away. Then when you start up again, do lots of stretching and warming up before you really push it. I agree that the way to avoid knee pain from cycling is to choose lower gears. Spin, don't pump high gears. When I was learning this lesson I also found that choosing a lower gear and spinning actually made me a little faster.

When I was in my mid 20s, my doctor told me I would have a limp for the rest of my life due to two injuries from Motocross on same knee. PT guy said if I ever wanted to walk semi-normal again I should take up biking & swimming. Cycling definitely diminished the limp to unnoticeable (I think). Although when I first started cycling if I didn't ride for a week or so, my knee would stiffen up and my walk would be impacted. Now that I'm "all in" as far as cycling goes, I've never had a break long enough for that to happen again :)

Again, I'll talk to your doctor first in any case.