Cyclist Squats: How To Strengthen Your Legs With Sore Knees

We’ve written before about how helpful Spanish squats and reverse lunges can be if you sometimes struggle doing exercise due to knee pain.

And according to orthopaedic surgeon Dr Chris Raynor, you can add “cycling squats” to that list.

In a YouTube short, the expert said he loves to use these kinds of exercises “for rehabilitation after knee injury or knee surgery, because I think that they are a safe way of activating the quadricep muscle and developing quadricep strength”.

Men’s Health, meanwhile, called them the “ultimate quad burn” which can increase your ankle mobility, reduce the strain on your lower back, and, of course, strengthen your legs.

Also known as “heel elevation squats”, cyclist squats involve – surprise – keeping your heels elevated as you perform the exercise.

This is sometimes done with a sloped squat ramp or “riser”.

You should keep your feet together as you perform the movement, which can be done with or without a kettlebell or dumbbell held in front of you to your chest.

Cyclist or heel elevated squats with a kettlebell are called “goblet cyclist squats”.

• Stand on a squat ramp or “riser” with your feet together, torso straight, and arms either straight in front of you or holding a weight to your chest.
• Lower yourself down, hinging at the hips and knees, as if you’re trying to tuck your bottom on top of your heels.
• Rise back up, “pushing” the floor away with your feet.

This type of squat “encourages more work from the quads, and less on the hips, low back and adductors” than a regular squat, Mirafit explained.

They added that for people with weaker knees, cycling squats can help you progressively overload the joint over time, protecting it from future harm.

The heel elevation can help you achieve a deeper squat, too. And if you’re holding a kettlebell while doing the exercise, you’ll work your postural muscles, which help both your upper and lower back.

Dr Raynor added that goblet cyclist squats may help to activate the vastus medialus obliqus (VMO), a teardrop-shaped muscle in our upper legs, as “one of the best ways to make sure that it is engaged is to activate the quad when it is in its most lengthened position”.

That happens during deeper squats, like this one. The VMO is a key muscle in stabilising our knees.

A 2025 paper found that “elevated heel heights… can enhance squat stability by reducing centre of pressure (COP) deviation and trunk lean, both of which are key factors for minimising injury risks in squatting exercise”.