Right pain in the knee! How to manage and treat ITB Syndrome whilst training for a marathon.
Posted on 21st February 2025 at 19:27
Have you been training for a marathon and recently noticed pain at the side of your knee that does not go away until you’ve stopped running?
If this sounds familiar, it may be an Iliotibial band syndrome (ITB Syndrome) injury.
ITB Syndrome is a common injury amongst the running population presenting with lateral knee and, or hip pain.
The IT Band is a long tendon structure that runs from the side of your hip all the way along the lateral side of your thigh and attaches onto the knee.
For some time, ITB Syndrome was considered a ‘friction syndrome’ with the IT Band thought to cause friction on the lateral structures of the knee causing pain and discomfort. More recently, due to new research, its thought to suggest that ITB syndrome is a compression type of injury. This new research has led to a change in management of the condition.
Management & Treatment Options:
Loss of strength and control around the hips are thoughts to be the key contributors of developing ITB syndrome. Short term treatment option is to first reduce symptoms and then address the causation factors to prevent future episodes. Easy said then done when you’ve got a marathon event coming up in weeks, hey!
However, there are many self management tips you can try to ease symptoms straight away in preparation for your upcoming marathon, here are a few below:
Tips to help self manage symptoms:
1. Keep running miles within a comfortable range.
Don’t over do the running miles. If you are only a few weeks away from the marathon, maybe now is a good time to taper? If you’re a few weeks / months into training, try to keep the running miles to a comfortable range and do not exceed until the body has adjusted to the load. You don’t want to be increasing the miles with an irritable tendon at this stage of training.
2. Keep running surface the same.
Changing in the load and surface can alter how we run, therefore, keep to the same surface you are running on as your body in time will adjust to this surface. Have you ever tried running on sand, it’s hard work, requires more effort and will change how we run, therefore if you are running on a treadmill or road, stick to that surface until symptoms settle.
3. Foam Roll
Get into a habit of foam rolling for 10mins after you’ve been out for a run. Good recovery habits will pay dividends to your running performance and injury prevention. Yes, it may feel a little sore to start with but trust me, over time it will ease and your tendon will become more flexible.
4. Ice, Ice, Ice Baby!
Apply an ice pack for 10mins following each run on the lateral side of your knee. Ice is a great method for reducing pain. Ice for 10mins up to 4 x per day. A reduction in pain will help you to keep ticking over the miles.
5. Sports Massage
A sports massage leading up to the marathon and during your training can really help ease symptoms and muscle tightness of the surrounding muscles. We recommend a 30min appointment every week or fortnight to help with recovery and performance.
Long term solution:
1. Strength & Conditioning
If you have a little more time on your hands in the lead up to the event, or perhaps you want to prepare for your next marathon to prevent knee pain, we recommend following a structured strength and conditioning programme to target overall body strength and mobility. Targeting specific areas including the buttock, core and leg muscles, twice per week can really make the difference in preventing knee pain from occurring in the first place.
When might be a good time to seek help?
1. If the pain does not go away with self management tips
2. The pain is worsening
3. You’re ready to prepare and prevent future episodes from occurring and would like a strength programme.
We hope you found these self management tips helpful in the lead up to your marathon. If you were looking to prevent a running injury from occurring, and wanted more information about our Strength & Conditioning Programmes, please head over to our contact page, send an enquiry form to the team and we look forward to discussing how we can help.
To find out more information about our sports performance recovery methods, we have a couple of fantastic blogs where we share an insight into the benefits of a sports massage and the latest state of the art air compression technology to relieve muscle soreness.
Tagged as: Foam Rolling, ITB Syndrome, Marathon Training Tips, Sports Massage, Strength & Conditioning
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