I’m sure you’ve been wondering what ever happened to my knee…right? Well, regardless, you get the update anyway!

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You may remember back in December I formulated a plan to blitzkrieg my left knee into believing it was healthy all year. I had a series of drugs, vitamins and primal diets I was going to try out, but like many of my plans, this one was too ambitious. What I finally settled on was the following:

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1. Continue with the viscosupplementation treatments (so far only one since the season started).

2. 2000 mg of glucosamine sulphate a day.

3. 2000 mg to 3000 mg of fish oil (Omega3) a day.

4. A bunch of frozen red berries every day.

Results

In two words: not conclusive. However, I’ve learned some things this season that seem to be valuable – 1) this problem is not going away, and 2) it appears to be manageable. Whether because of the shots I got half a year ago, or the extra stuff I’ve been doing, the knee is responding generally better than before.

I still get pain on many rides (maybe 50%), and I definitely have to favor my right leg more, which is far from ideal. However, I’ve noticed two things this year that are encouraging:

• The pain is just pain and it goes away, either during the ride or afterwards. It’s temporary.
• The pain I feel doesn’t seem to lead to a worsening of my problem (the osteoarthritis). What I mean is, I can have pain on an entire ride one day and go out the following day with nothing at all. For the time being at least, I don’t feel like the knee is getting worse from the abuse I pile on it 6 days a week.

My imagination tells me that the needles (viscosupplementation) are doing the most good and the glucosamine / fish oil / berries help to prolong or maintain the goodness. I also seem to feel a bit better when I up the fish oil intake, but can’t be sure.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this little update and if anyone else out there has a story to tell about this problem, I noticed that there are many silent visitors to my articles on knees and arthritis, so I’m sure it would be viewed with interest by more than just me!