Originally Posted by
Tourist in MSN
You should know from past riding what you can and can not do in a day. Or how fast. I suspect maybe overstress for a brief period of time. I have knee problems (I am 63, most people my age do) but I no longer stand on the pedals to accelerate from a stop or to power up a hill, I stay seated and gear down instead. That does wonders for my knees.
There is an old theory that pain in front of knee means saddle too low, pain in back of knee and the saddle is too high.
Oddly against conventional wisdom what felt slightly better to me after the pain started was to gear up and slow my cadence but I ended up doing both as time went on. I did move my seat up and back a bit after the second day and I'll continue to tweak that. I have a MTB clipless setup (Shimano M200 hard sole) I can try again although I absolutely hate being clipped. I've been a diehard flats/platform guy for decades. I am slightly bow legged and my ankle tends to roll. I tried pedal extenders a few years ago because I was rubbing my cranks at times with my heel but those were useless and didn't feel right and I corrected most of that myself.
For the time being with my schedule... I'll only be doing these 200-300 mile 3-4 day gravel tours a few times a year. With not doing them a lot it will be hard to quantify and test tweaks of what works and what doesn't. Right now, the obvious answer is SLOW DOWN and enjoy it!!! I'll still be doing my average 100 or so miles a week 30 miles at a time without pain (hopefully). I hope eventually to do more extensive touring because i really do enjoy it. If I can only get the wife on board
