Knee Pain after 5km Cycling

I am having a problem with pain in the back of my right knee on both sides when I hit the 5km mark of my ride. I will give you some background. I have been fighting with this off and on for about a year now. There has been no injury to speak of. I have had a proper bike fit and have try many different seat heights to alleviate this pain. my injury history on this leg is I had some cartilage taking out of that knee 15 years ago and the ankle has been rolled really bad too many times to count. The ankle is very sloppy. I dont have any real pain when i walk but the knee does remain sore for the rest of the day after i ride. I would appreciate any help you can offer as I am at my wits end with this and i cant get in to see the cycling guru physiotheropist in my area til april 25. I have been stretching out my hamstrings like crazy and getting some releif from this.
I have started doing light hamstring and quad exercise as well.

Hi mtbguy,

I'm not a Physio so I'm only saying my opinion but where abouts on the back of the knee? If stretching hamstrings gives you some relieve it could be the insertions of those muscles behind the knee, biceps femoris possibly. Even if you have to wait to see the physio I'd book in just to get it looked at in detail, and I'm sure some of the guys/ladies here can go into more detail than me.

thanks for your response. I have really started focusing on those areas of the hamstring recentley so i will see how it goes. My it band is tight where it inserts in the side of the knee as well.

If you can you can use a foam roller to roll out the fascia that makes up the ITB. If you search Google you can find stretches for it as well, such as leaning against a bench with your legs out and pushing downwards. Like you said continue with the hamstring stretches and you could possible do light strengthening exercises for them too such as eccentric contractions.