Having spent 9 months off the bike following my knee cap mishap (not all due to the injury, had no bottle to ride in the ice and snow!)has anybody else had this injury and started riding again? I’ve been riding again for 3 weeks and with my very poor fitness making me very slow and plenty of mud around I’m wasn’t that bothered with coming off. Now a little faster and the ground noticeably harder the fear of falling off came back yesterday.

If anybody has had this injury, do you use knee protection at all and does armour fit close to the joint where it could effect the tracking of the patella causing a new problem? 661 evo’s was the pads I was looking at

Had a ruptured patella tendon 13 years ago. If I’m doing drops or dh then I pad up also tend to wear pads on new routes in known rocky areas just in case.

Cold weather seems to effect my knee too so I pad up in winter too , Don’t have any experience of the Evo pads but I’m comfy in Kyle straights

I was off the bike after a stack in the alps in July. Dislocated patella and cracked a large peice of bone off in the process. calf got stuck on some rope at the side of the track whilst i went over it. Got almost back to normal in Feb, then slipped coming downhill hill walking in the peaks and the other one popped out – fortunately not half as bad. I feel double my age (35) at the moment and hVe put weight on not being on the bike.

After speaking to various about this, ive been told it’s just a case of building VMO and quads up. I think a support/brace wouldn’t stop the patella coming out if it really wanted to.

Would love to be told otherwise though, especially if the brace was comfortable and didn’t have a mind of it’s own!

The pads may also act as mental reassurance.

Beagle, I too snapped off a large lump of knee cap, lost 25% of the suface area and part of the track, the surgeon had great pleasure showing me the one pound coin size lump of bone and cartlidge. Again like you my injury was done walking, on a fell in the lake district. When you did your original injury didn’t have problems with falling over for no reason? Likely when this happens I always land on the other knee.

Got one last session with physio in two weeks time, so i’ll ask his advice

Popped my patella in my left knee 2 years ago trying to impress my girlfriend playing volleyball. I took it easy for a little while, concentrated on building the muscels arroung my knee with a good bit of flat riding in progressivly bigger gears with slow sticky tyres then steady mountain biking with my girlfriend. I the got back to doing my own thing and after a couple of crashes and no further damage to my knee i now feel it is well behind me.

Yep, done mine several times (both knees), thankfully not for quite a while as it’s by far the most painful thing I’ve ever done.
Hasn’t stopped me riding at all, have never considered using knee pads. I did eventually give up squash, windsurfing & cricket (although several years after the 1st injury)

Thanks for the feedback, no pads then…

I’m using flat pedals at the moment, are any of you guys using spuds?

What side of your knee did your kneecap end up on and what exercises did the physio give you?

Hi,

I do various types of squates including using a gym style elastic band, towel held between my legs and one legged squates. I also stand on one leg on an uneven surface and do lunges with the bad leg pushed into an uneven surface.