“Your knees shouldn’t go over your toes”

Let’s break this very common myth down and think a bit more critically about it.

First, why shouldn’t your toes go over your knees? According to 1 study that became wildly popularized, letting your knees come over your toes during a squat increases the pressure in your knees. While this is true, it does not mean it is a bad thing or bad for your knees.

I have been watching amazing success stories and ideas behind Ben Patrick ‘kneesovertoesguy’. This guy has revolutionized the idea of bulletproofing knees so they are resistant to injury and completely free of pain.

He has ventured out and began to question the world of ‘why your knees shouldn’t go over your toes’. If you truly think about how we move in our everyday lives, our knees go over our toes almost every single day. Have you ever gone down a staircase? Have you ever walked down hill on a slope? Every single step, your knee is going over your toe. No way around it! Unless you go backward of course….

So, why not start to train for these things?

A few prerequisites we need to work is dorsiflexion of the ankle, and having mobility of full flexion of the knee, and lower body strength as opposed to strictly hip dominant strength.

If you’re big on the instagram game, I highly advise you follow @kneesovertoesguy. And if you see me for some knee pain, you bet we will be working some of these principles into your new movement routines and patterns!