How to Strategically and Successfully Train Around Two Common Lower Body Injuries
When you’re training at Invictus Fitness, lower body injuries don’t mean you stop showing up, they mean you get more intentional with how you train. The goal is always the same: keep you moving forward while respecting what your body is telling you. Let’s walk through two common situations and how to handle them.
What should you do when you have pain in the front of the knee?
First, if you’re dealing with pain in the front of the knee on one leg, often associated with Patellar tendinitis, we need to reduce irritation without losing strength. That usually means temporarily limiting deep knee flexion and any movements that create sharp or lingering pain. Instead, we’ll shift to pain-free patterns like box squats, controlled step-ups, sled pushes or drags, and isometric holds like split squat holds at tolerable depths. Tempo becomes your friend here. Slowing things down gives you more control and often reduces stress on the tendon. At the same time, we’re building capacity in the surrounding musculature, especially the quads, glutes, and hamstrings, so when you return to full range movements, you’re in a better position than before.
What should you do when you have SI joint pain?
Another common lower body injury is SI joint discomfort. If that’s your situation, the approach is a little different. Here, the focus is on restoring stability and control. The SI joint doesn’t typically like excessive asymmetry or uncontrolled movement, so we’ll temporarily reduce or adjust things like heavy single-leg work, high-impact movements, or anything that causes shifting or discomfort through the pelvis. Instead, we’ll prioritize exercises that reinforce hip stability. Think glute bridges, hip thrusts, carries, well-executed hinge mechanics, and core work that emphasizes breathing, bracing, and positional awareness. We want your hips and trunk working together so the joint feels supported. Over time, as control improves, we can begin reintroducing more dynamic and unilateral work.
In both cases, it’s important to understand that healing timelines are not fixed. They depend on the extent of the injury, how long it’s been there, and how consistently you’re training within the right boundaries. Your job is to stay in pain-free or low-irritation ranges while continuing to build strength and capacity. A key piece of this is re-testing. About once per week, you should lightly and slowly revisit the movement or range of motion that was previously painful. If it feels better, we can start to reintroduce it gradually. If it doesn’t, we keep building around it.
Communication with your coach is everything here. Before and during every class, let us know what you’re feeling. We can help you customize the day’s training so you’re still getting a productive session without setting yourself back. These small, daily adjustments are what allow you to stay consistent and make progress, even while dealing with pain. You don’t need to guess, and you definitely don’t need to push through something that doesn’t feel right.
If you’re doing all of this and not seeing improvement after a few weeks, that’s your signal to bring in more support. A qualified physical therapist can help identify what’s really going on and give you a more targeted plan. That works alongside what we’re doing here, not instead of it. If you have a doctor, physical therapist, or chiropractor who tells you to completely cease physical activity while you heal from a mild to moderate injury, find a new doctor. In my opinion, they don’t have your best interest in mind.
The bottom line is that you can keep training. You just need to train with intention. Customize your movements, stay consistent, communicate with your coach, and be patient with the process. If you do that, you’ll come out the other side stronger and more resilient.