The Victim Joint: How Old Injuries Can Dictate New Pain

Replies in from the Conor McGregor post a few weeks ago have been interesting

Some asking about their own knee injuries

Some critiquing McGregor's readiness and previous injuries

Some critiquing McGregors tactics in the fight

And some talking about McGregors personal life

I'm not going to touch personal life.

As far as he goes, and any other celeb, I separate the performance from the artist.

As much as possible at least.

In fact, I have zero interest in almost any celebrity's life outside of the arena in which I want to celebrate them in.

So Tactics.

Again, not my field.

I've read a few bits, and it seems a well rehearsed attack that just didn't land on the day.

And that is life, when we add in chaos, shit happens.

So then, injuries, rehab and knees.

The Knee as a "Victim Joint"

Outside of an acute injury, knees often become what I refer to as a “Victim Joint”

The elbow is similar.

Aches and pains in the knee often come around from the joint being overloaded or maybe more accurately, misloaded.

We have in a leg, a big ball and socket joint at the top, a foot-ankle complex at the bottom and the poor knee in the middle.

The hip has a stack of motion available and some of the biggest muscles in the body around it.

The foot-ankle complex, there’s 26 bones in a foot giving 33 joints. That all adds up to a stack of potential motion.

And in between is the knee. Essentially a hinge with some rotation available.

But what happens when:

That rotation is unavailable

There’s too much rotation asked of it

The foot - ankle complex isn’t moving enough

The Hip isn’t accessing all it’s potential

There’s a weakness on the other side

The demands on the body are uneven (single sided sports, such as golf and others

Is there some reason why some of the most common complaints we get from people are:

Glutes “not firing”

Tight hip flexors

Tight IT band

Peroneals (muscles on outside of shin) are tight

Plantar Fasciitis and / or bunion

Is it not interesting how people seem to have

One hamstring tight / injured not the other

One hip tighter than the other

One knee is sore, the other ok

One side adductors hurt more than the other

One foot gets sore, gets the bunion, not the other

Of course, I’m generalising and simply pointing out things I commonly see and hear, I’m not talking specifically about any one person or any of the “more interesting” stuff we see.

The Nervous System's Short-Term Solutions

So, a thought exercise, and it can only be a thought exercise.

McGregor badly broke his lower leg bones. I know several others who suffered similar injuries albeit from different circumstances.

Our nervous system is amazing at short term solutions.

So to get you home, to get to the next sunrise, you’ll shift all your weight onto the non injured side.

You’ll shift your movement mechanics to compensate for the injury.

And even after the bones have healed, the soft tissue has healed, I still see people with altered movement mechanics.

Maybe the still don’t fully commit to the previously injured leg.

Maybe that leg swings forward quickly, but you get off it quick leading to an uneven stride.

One hamstring gets to experience length, the other not so much. Maybe that hamstring gets tight.

The knee on the old injured side doesn’t bend too much in gait, because it’s looking to shift the weight back as quickly as possible, so does the “good knee” now have to pick up the slack?

We can theorise all day long. And I do find it fun to do so looking at movement through the lens of Anatomy in Motion.

And then to theorise about the manner in which I’d address these issues and provide an environment for the body to reset back to preinjured settings, if that is actually possible.

The truth is, often it’s not possible. And it then needs management strategies, especially when one injury is exacerbated by another injury, and another from living an “interesting” life.

And a fighter, well that’s interesting alright.

The Ghost in the Machine: Why Healed Tissues Still Hurt

Movement, moving, healing, these are things we take for granted.

But the body is complex and complicated.

Bones and soft tissues should be healed 6-12 weeks post injury, so why then do people still have pain 6 months later?

I’m not sure we have an answer.

We have theories, many conflict with each other.

But kind of agree that it’s the old brain, the central nervous system still running a “program” that no longer serves.

That short term solution that is no longer needed.

It’s why I ask for assessment videos from my online clients

It’s why I ask the questions I ask, and spend time looking at exercise technique videos from clients.

Much of the time, I look at the technique videos as if they’re movement assessments and then remember to congratulate the person on their PR or their new range of motion or whatever.

So, to bring this back to the start of the email.

Could McGregors injury have been set up by his old injuries?

I suspect that has more to do with what happened than the flying kick. The kick was just the straw that broke the camel's back.

Can he come back from it?

Well that remains to be seen.