Originally Posted by pannierpacker

I started commuting in March. For the first 4 months, I never changed my gear, I would leave it at the highest setting. When I got to a hill I would stand up and pushing really hard and eventually climb it. It was fun and a good workout, but I noticed about a month ago that my knees were starting to get sore from it and at one point they were always sore, even when I wasnt going over hills. Since then I've started switching my gears and strive for rpms at around 60-70 a minute as I heard thats optimal for knee health. I also made sure my seat was up high enough so that my leg is straight on my down stroke.

Although the pain is less, I still feel it from time to time, and this occurs when I hardly stress my knees at all. I can ride on flat land in a very easy gear and I still feel a little sore later. It's like my knees are chronically sore now. I wish I could go back to my first few months of biking where no matter what I did to my knees they felt just fine afterwards. Did I mess up my knees for good? Am I going to have to deal with this for life now? It really sucks because I've been kinda having to limit my speed lately, for fear of hurting my knees again.