Knee exercises for strength are an important part of any fitness routine, no matter how old or fit you are.

Walking, climbing stairs, and even getting up from a chair all require the use of strong knees. 

Being one of the body’s most intricate and frequently used joints, the knee needs to be strong and healthy.

Thus, knee exercises for strength are important for keeping knees healthy, lowering the risk of injury, improving balance and stability, reducing pain and discomfort, and improving overall health and fitness. 

Adding knee exercises to your workout routine can help you keep your knees strong and healthy, so you can stay active and enjoy all the benefits of a healthy lifestyle.

Knee Exercises for Strength – Why We Need It

Our bones and muscles start to weaken as we become older.

Our bodies naturally have a tendency to lose flexibility and become more prone to injuries. 

This is particularly noticeable in our knees, which bear the brunt of our body weight.

For obvious reasons, our knees are quite essential to us.

They support our movement when we walk, run, dance, and in general. 

So what takes place when they start to weaken?

In the United States, about 36 million falls are reported among older adults each year. This equates to roughly one out of every four older adults falling each year, making falls a public health concern, particularly among the aging population.

While this may seem discouraging, it’s not all bad news! These incidents can often be prevented by taking steps to make your knees (and other joints) strong and healthy.

Yes, your knees may feel fine now, but sooner or later they’re going to start giving you trouble if you don’t take care of them. And by “take care of them,” I don’t mean just popping some pills when they start to hurt. I mean making sure your knees are strong and healthy.

And the best way to help your knees become stronger is to work on the parts of your leg that connect the knee – our hips, thighs and the calves. And when these parts are strong your knees get better!

Here are eight easy and the best knee exercises for strength that you can do to make your knees strong, help fix knee pain and increase your mobility. It’s perfect for beginners, seniors, and women over 50.

????At the bottom of this article, you will find a button to download a free Fitness Journal.

8 Knee Exercises for Strength

1. Knee Circle

How to do it: Move your knees in a circular motion, paying attention to keeping your feet flat on the floor. Swap direction after 30 seconds. 

Benefits: Works on the joints including ankles, and knees and muscles including hamstrings, calves, and thighs.

2. Heel Raises

How to do it: Hold onto a chair and rise up onto your toes, lifting your heels as high as possible.  If it’s going to be more manageable for you to do this on a chair, you’re still going to get great results! If you’d like to try the more advanced version, you can do this on one leg. Do this for 30 seconds.

Benefit: The heel raise will strengthen our calf, which helps support the knee.

3. Straight Leg Raises

How to do it: Lay on your back and prop yourself up on your elbows. Pull your toes towards your chest and clench on that muscle in the front of the thigh, locking your knees straight.

Lift your leg, hold, and ensure that your knees stays straight the whole time.

Remember if you’re feeling pain stop doing the exercise.

Do 30 seconds on each leg.

Benefit: To strengthen the quad muscles, and a strong quad muscle takes all the pressure off our knee joint.

4. Side Leg Raise

How to do it: Keep your body straight, bend the knee on the floor to a 90-degree angle, then activate the muscle on your straight leg as you raise it up. Make this movement slow and purposeful, hold, and bring it back down again.

Repeat this for 30 seconds.

Benefits: Side leg raises are great for strengthening the hip abductors. You’ll feel it opening up your hip flexors and strengthening your quads.

5. Knee Pillow Squeeze

How to do it: Place a pillow (or one or two towels rolled together) between your knees. Lie on your back, arms to the side, and squeeze your knees inwards towards the pillow, and then release.

Continue squeezing your knees together for 30 seconds and  make sure that you keep your back flat.

Benefits : It’s a Pilates exercise that works the inner thighs and the pelvic floor muscles. We’re strengthening the muscles that connect the knees because when those muscles are strong, the pressure is taken off the knee.

You can also use a Foam Roller and you can buy it here: ???? Shop – Foam Roller

6. Short Arcs

How to do it: You will need two towels rolled up together for this exercise.

As you tighten your thigh muscle, gently lift the foot off the floor until your knee is straight, hold for a few seconds, and then slowly lower it down again.

Preform for 30 seconds on each leg.

Benefits: This isn’t a fast exercise, and you’re definitely going to feel it in your quads! By pulling your toes towards your body, we will strengthen our quadriceps muscles.

7. Bridge

How to do it: Lie on your back with your fingers touching your heels, and lift your bottom as high as you can without arching your back. Hold for a few seconds, then come back up and squeeze the glutes the whole time.

Check to see if you’re pushing from your heels or your back. All the power is going to come from your hips and glutes.

Benefits: This is one of those magical exercises. It works your glutes and your hamstrings, plus it also helps our hip mobility while strengthening our lower back. All of those things are super important to help us maintain our mobility as we get older.

8. Hamstring Stretch

How to do it: You can either touch your toes or keep your knees completely bent. Do what’s comfortable for you.

Do this for 30 seconds.

Benefit: Hamstring stretches improve flexibility in the muscles on the back of the thigh. And it can improve the range of motion in the hips.

Bonus Exercise

Knee Hugs

How to do it: Pull your knees in tight and try to balance for a little bit. Touch your toes to the floor if you can’t balance and then try and put your toes up again.

Benefits : It works your hip flexors and quad muscles. It also helps reduce compression in the spine.

Wrapping up…

I’ve had lots of knee pain in the past and these exercises really helped. I recommend that you do these Knee Exercises for Strength 5 times a week. It’s very very doable. You can incorporate this into any other workout you’re doing or into just before you do a walk or after.

If you’re up to it, I invite you to set your intention today. Write down your body’s current state and what you want to achieve, and write down how these exercises can benefit you.

And then, join Fabulous 50s Challenge Private Facebook Group, introduce yourself, and share this with us. Make a commitment to do this exercise, this way you enhance your motivation and get full support from the community.

Remember, it’s all about maintenance. Whatever you can do now to strengthen your knees is going to benefit you every single year for the rest of your life.

PS: I created a Free Fitness Journal – Knee Exercises for Strength, get it below and share it with someone who may also benefit from doing this workout.

Gain a love for exercise and join over 1 million others today! ????

Fabulous50s Workouts are designed with you in mind. They are meant to be a challenge, with the aim of improving your overall strength but they are very doable.

We don’t need to be athletes now we’re over 50, but we do need to do some form of physical activity every single day. Aim to be 1% better than you were yesterday and you are a success.

Now, let’s celebrate YOU and enjoy the process!

✅ Join the Private Group -> Fabulous 50s Challenge Group

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