valgus knee collapse

How To Correct Valgus Knee Collapse

Hey EarthFIT fam! Coach Sam here. Today, we’re gonna go over how to correct one of the most common imbalances that we see as trainers inside the gym without further ado, let’s get right into it. So the imbalance I’m gonna talk about today happens in the lower body. It happens when we squat primarily, and that is a knee collapse. So a lot of times what it looks like is we’ll squat down and then we have a knee come inward, or it could be the other knee or both knees sometimes.

And then we’re really struggling to get up. You’ll see a lot of shaking with that. So if this is you, this is a perfect video. We’re gonna dissect specifically what causes those issues. Then I’m gonna tell you how we can go about correcting them with simple warmups. So let’s get right into it. 

So the knee collapse is the scientific name for that would be a valgus knee collapse. That’s where our knees kind of collapse inward as we squat. It doesn’t have to be both of ’em. Like I said, it could be one. Now what causes this? I like to look at above or below where the imbalances occuring. So in this case, it’s gonna be on our knees, right? The knee is shaky for this specific issue. It’s either an ankle issue, immobility or stability in the ankle or in the hips, glute area, specifically for the valgus knee collapse we commonly see underdeveloped, lateral glute muscles, gluteus minimus, TFL kind of… even the gluteus maximus, meaning your side butt muscles aren’t firing. So the knee collapses. These are the muscles that are used to turn it out. So we’re gonna want to definitely activate those, strengthen those. 

And we don’t wanna neglect the footer ankle because a lot of knee problems do stem from, the foot or the ankle. So for that, we’re gonna wanna make sure that we’re mobile. We have full ranges of motion. So some specific drills you could do, if you find yourself in this position, having this knee collapse, you could do these three things before you train and kind of test and see how does your squat feel? So, first thing before we do any mobility, we always want to test before we retest. So the first thing that I’d have you guys do would be do two to three squats, just body weight. Okay. See, are those knees collapsing inward? Okay. If they are, then you would want to proceed to the next kind of set of drills. So if you have that knee collapse, the first thing you can do, I can show you the advanced version and the basics. 

DRILL 1 (Basic): We’ll start with the basics. You can grab something at home. If you wanna do this, or in the gym. Just grab something that can keep you nice and stable. From there, we’re just gonna look at our toe and we’re simply going to do the alphabet with our foot. So all the way through the alphabet, and then switch, make sure you do it on the other side.

Now, if you’re noticing, “Hey, I really can’t pull it up or go to the side with my ankle..” That’s a clue. You’re definitely gonna want to put some extra emphasis on that drill then.

DRILL 1 (Advanced): Let’s say you’re an advanced client. but you still feel like your ankles or knees are giving you problems and you have good balance. You can simply balance up here. This is gonna not only work this foot. Now we’re working this one at the same time. 

So again, you just do the alphabet standing on some type of an imbalance surface, whether that’s a stability pad, or even like outside, you could do it in the grass or like on loose gravel or something like that. So that’d be the first thing that gets our ankle. Nice and fired up.

DRILL 2: Second thing. We’re gonna wanna work on those lateral glute muscles, they’re responsible. There’s tons of ways you can do this. My favorite way is 7 way hips. I’ve made videos on this. But if we’re specifically trying to target that, we can simply just lay down on the ground here, point your toe down, and then you come up, you wanna do about 10 of these and then we can do small circles either forward. And then after we get to forward, do them backwards for 10, um, that you will start to feel right here in the lateral glute a pretty deep burn, make sure you switch and do the other side. 

So after we’ve hit the ankle up, getting that nice and mobile we’ve hit the glute, lateral glute up. It’s nice to fire it up.

DRILL 3: Then we can actually go into a squat. So in this case, I’m gonna say it was my, my right knee. That was collapsing inward. You could take this band. You don’t need a really thick band. And this is one, obviously you perform in the gym. You could put that around your knee there or above or below, don’t put it directly on there and then you just squat. So it’s actually gonna push my knee out that way. Right. But what I have to do is I have to fight that. I actually have to try to almost bring it in like what’s happening with your knee and that will activate these glute muscles. So that’s three things that you could do if you’re noticing that your knee is collapsing inward while you squat, otherwise known as the valgus knee collapse. 

If you have that issue, we gotta address the foot. We have to address the lateral glute. And then it’s always a good idea to kind of get into the actual squat position. After with the band after you’ve done those three drills, I would have you try it again. See, are we still shaking? Has it improved? and then rinse and repeat, remember with mobility or whenever we’re trying to correct an issue, more in this case actually is better. So that is all I have for you today. I hope you guys enjoyed this video. If you loved it give me a heart, if you liked it, give me a thumbs up and as always, stay strong.

-EarthFIT Coach Sam