Here Be Dragons! The Myth Of Knees-Over-Toes

How often have you been told to keep your knees over your toes when doing sports or exercising?

This belief originated from Dr. Karl Klein when he published his research in 1961 stating that deep squatting over-stretched the ligaments of the knee. After being picked up by Sports Illustrated in 1962, his theory became accepted across the board - the Marine Corps eliminated the squat jumper from their programme and gym teachers were banned from using the full squat in physical education classes. The myth was born and, to this day, walk into any gym and see most people only squatting to a parallel depth and bending their knee as far as their toe.

Dr. John Pulskamp was one of the few voices cautioning against this, and in 1964 he wrote that: ‘full squats are not bad for the knees and they should certainly not be omitted out of fear of knee injury’, but his words were in vain and, by the end of the decade, the squat had disappeared from American life altogether.

A cue to limit our knees moving past our toes is nothing more than a quick fix to a deeper problem.

Here Be Dragons

Dangerous or unexplored territories.

The medieval practice of putting illustrations of dragons, sea monsters and other mythological creatures on uncharted areas of maps where potential dangers were thought to exist.

In order to understand what is ‘right’ or ‘correct’ movement, the best place to start would be to look at the joints themselves. The surface of the joint tells us how it is designed to move and which planes of movement it is able to access (have a look here for more explanation on planes of movement) and we can also factor in the relationship between the foot, knee and hip as well as the three-dimensional role the muscles play.

The knee joint is a hinge type synovial joint, which allows for flexion and extension (and a small degree of medial and lateral rotation). It is formed by articulations between the patella, femur and tibia. Knee flexion gives us the ability to take our knee past our toes and, thanks to movement above at the hip and below at the ankle, internally and externally rotate towards the big toe and out towards the little toe. The knee has access to movement primarily in the Sagittal Plane, but some small movement in the Transverse plane.

If we have all this access to movement thanks to the joints, why are we limiting it to a small amount of knee flexion with no rotation?

“To protect it from risk of injury” you might say.

What if, by limiting and restricting movement of the knee beyond the ankle or to remain over the second toe, this only served to increase the chance of injury?

These are own our dragons, the places we refuse to go and never visit because the only time we go there something bad happens to us. If we’re not familiar with accessing certain movements, when we go there - intentionally or not - they’ll be scary and a small roll of the ankle can end up becoming an ankle sprain, or a trip or stumble can result in a serious fall. We can choose to remain vulnerable or explore unchartered territories by moving into them, giving our body and nervous system the information it needs to feel comfortable in these new spaces and to respond appropriately when we’re in them.

For those of you wanting guidance on this path, Billy offers in-person and remote Natural Movement sessions.
Alternatively, if you are looking to incorporate this in a more controlled place because you have pain or restricted movement, I look forward to connecting over a session.

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