Your balancing confldently in half moon pose and the pose feels firm and steady There’s onlyone problem: You’re hyperextending the knee of your standing leg. When you extend, or straighten, your knee beyond a straight line, it’s called hyperextension, which can injure the knee and other parts of your body It’s quite common among yoga students at all levels, and certain asanas can exacerbate the condition ifyou repeatedly do them incorrectly Fortunately you can learn to practice in a way that both aligns and protects your knees and makes them stronger and healthier.
WHATS MY LINE?
When a knee that isn’t prone to hyperextension extends, its ligaments—the cords of connective tissue that join the thighbone to the shinbone —pull taut and stop the two bones at the pointwhere they lie directly in line with each other. If your knee hyperextends, that means its ligaments are too long, and so theydon’t stop the bones untilyour leg has moved beyonda straight line. If you’re uncertain about whether your knees hyperextend, stand sideways in front of a full—length mirror, gently press your knees backward until you are unable to move them back any further, and envision an imaginary line running down the side of your leg from your hip joint to your ankle. If the center of your knee ends up behind that line, it is hyperextended.
Standing with your knees locked back in hyperextension can cause a host ofproblems inyour knees and also inyour legs, hips, and spine. In addition to overstretching the ligaments, hyperextension stresses the front of the knee joint surfaces and weakens the quadriceps muscles. Over time, this misalignment may create deeper hyperextesision, ligament strains or tears, cartilage degeneration, and arthritis of the knee joint or kneecap. What’s more, ifyou push the knee back with enough force, you can tear a ligament, most likely the anterior cruciate. Standingin hyperextensionputs excess pressure on your heels and the front of your shins, which can lead to inflammation.
