Ben Patrick rebuilt his own knees by loading the range he was told to avoid. Here's how to turn that into a prehab block you assign every client.
"Knees over toes" got famous as a hot take on an old cue. Underneath the controversy is a genuinely useful idea for coaches: the knee gets stronger when you train it gradually through its full range, not when you spend your life avoiding it. This breakdown covers Ben Patrick's argument in our own words, adds our honest take for programming a real client roster, and shows how to save a joint-friendly prehab block once and reuse it across every client.
By Markus Evers · September 2026 · a Coachway video breakdown
the short version
Ben Patrick's case is that the "never let your knees pass your toes" rule is overstated - the joint becomes resilient when you progressively load it through its full range with movements like backward walking, tibialis raises, ATG split squats and slant-board squats, most of which need little or no equipment. The one thing a coach should do about it: stop treating knee position as something to avoid and start programming a short, progressive prehab block into every session for the desk-bound, older and load-heavy clients who need it most.
Ben Patrick on Mark Bell - Super Training Gym - Bulletproof Your Knees | Stronger in 5! Ft. Knees Over Toes Guy
Source: Mark Bell - Super Training Gym on YouTube - "Bulletproof Your Knees | Stronger in 5! Ft. Knees Over Toes Guy", a guest appearance by Ben Patrick, not his own channel. Watch on YouTube. We embed the public video and summarise it in our own words; the video, title and channel belong to their owners, and nothing here implies any endorsement of Coachway.
Who is Ben Patrick, and why coaches watch
Ben Patrick is the coach known online as the "Knees Over Toes Guy" and the founder of Athletic Truth Group (ATG). His story is the hook: after multiple knee surgeries and a stalled athletic career, he rebuilt his own knees by deliberately loading the ranges he had been told to protect, and turned that process into a system he now teaches, including his book Knee Ability Zero. For coaches he has become the default reference for joint-friendly, "bulletproofing" training - if a client has ever sent you a clip of someone walking backward on a treadmill and asked "should I be doing this," it was almost certainly his influence. That is the lens this page is written for: not "is Ben Patrick right about everything," but "what does his knee-resilience argument mean for how I program prehab across a whole roster."
What Ben Patrick actually argues (our summary)
This is our summary of the ideas in the video, in our own words - not a transcript. Watch the original for his exact examples, demos and progressions.
- 1
The "knees behind toes" rule is overstated. Avoiding knee flexion doesn't protect the joint - it just leaves it weak in the positions daily life demands. His argument is that the fix is loading the range, not fleeing it.
- 2
Resilience is built by progressive loading. Start light, in a range you can control, and add load or depth gradually over time - the same overload principle you already use for muscle, applied to knee tolerance.
- 3
Train the neglected front of the knee and the tibialis. Backward walking, backward sled drags and wall-based tibialis raises target tissue most general programs skip entirely - which is why they so often feel like the "missing piece."
- 4
The core movements need little or no equipment. ATG split squats, slant-board squats and Nordic curls scale from full bodyweight assistance up to loaded versions, so the work is portable to almost any client setup.
- 5
Consistency beats intensity. A little knee-prep work done often is the point - it's a habit layered into training, not a one-off rehab block, and the payoff comes from keeping it in the routine.
Coachway's take
We're on board with the core principle, and it's the reframe a lot of general coaches need: the knee is trainable tissue, not a fragile part to be worked around forever. Progressively loading knee flexion is just overload applied to a joint most programs ignore until it hurts. For the desk-bound, older and load-heavy clients on a typical roster, a few minutes of this per session is one of the highest-value, lowest-risk things you can add.
Where we'd add nuance for a coaching business: draw a hard line between prehab and rehab. Ben Patrick's material is aimed at people building resilience, and it's brilliant for that. But if a client has an acute injury, recent surgery, or knee pain that hasn't been assessed, your job is to route them to a physio or physician first - not to play therapist. Used as a warm-up block for cleared, generally healthy clients, this work is low-risk. Used to "fix" an undiagnosed knee, it's out of scope. Keeping that boundary clear protects your client and you.
The other coaching-specific point: he's demonstrating movements to a broad audience. You're prescribing them to twenty individuals with different starting ranges, equipment and confidence. A slant-board squat that's easy for one client is a genuine challenge for another - so the win isn't copying his exact progression, it's meeting each client where their range actually is and nudging it forward. That means clear demo videos, sensible starting numbers, and a way to see whether reps and pain are trending the right way.
So our version of his advice is: pick a small, progressive knee-prep block, start every client at a range they can own, and only add depth or load once the previous step feels easy and pain-free. Then - and this is the part that saves your evenings - build that block once as a reusable template and assign it, instead of rewriting a warm-up for every client from scratch.
Save the knee-prep block once, assign it to every client who needs it
A prehab idea is only useful if you can deliver it without rebuilding a warm-up for every client. That's what Coachway's workout builder is for: build your knee-prep progression as a reusable block - attach a demo video to each movement, set per-client rep ranges and progression rules, then assign it and adjust the starting range per person instead of starting blank. Because clients follow and log it in the branded client app, and you can capture pain, reps and range through structured check-ins, you can actually see whether the block is helping before you progress it.
If you want the strategy layer first, our primer on what corrective exercise is frames where prehab fits in a program, and the companion pieces on training deconditioned clients and exercise progression cover how to scale this block up safely over time.
Knee-friendly prehab block (5 movements, ~8-10 min)
A fill-in block you can copy into any suitable client's warm-up. The five movements follow Ben Patrick's signature progression - backward walk, tibialis raise, ATG split squat, slant-board squat, Nordic curl - starting easy and scalable to almost any setup. The starting sets, reps and progression rule below are our conservative coaching defaults, not figures from the video. Only use it as prehab for cleared, generally healthy clients; route anyone with an acute or undiagnosed knee issue to a physio first.
Knee prehab block
The block (conservative starting defaults)
| Movement | Targets | Start (sets x reps) | Your notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Backward walk / sled drag | Front-of-knee, quads | 2 x 1-2 min | — |
| Tibialis (wall shin) raise | Tibialis anterior | 2 x 15-25 | — |
| ATG split squat (assisted) | Knee flexion, glutes, VMO | 2 x 6-10 / side | — |
| Slant-board squat (heels up) | Quads, patellar tendon | 2 x 8-12 | — |
| Nordic curl (assisted) | Hamstrings (eccentric) | 2 x 3-6 | — |
Progression rule + scaling
| Step | Regress (make easier) | Progress (make harder) |
|---|---|---|
| Range | Shorten depth; more hand support | Add depth once pain-free |
| Load | Bodyweight / band assist | Add light load or sled weight |
| When to advance | Hold if pain rises or reps stall | Top of rep range, pain-free 2 sessions |
How to use it: run the block as a warm-up before the main session, 2-3x/week. Start every client at a range and assist level they fully control, keep it pain-free (mild working effort is fine, sharp joint pain is not), and only advance one variable at a time. These are starting defaults - adjust to the individual, and defer to any physio's guidance a client is already under.
KNEE-FRIENDLY PREHAB BLOCK (via Coachway) - inspired by Ben Patrick's progressions - ~8-10 min warm-up, 2-3x/week Prehab for cleared, generally healthy clients only. Route acute or undiagnosed knee issues to a physio first. THE BLOCK (conservative starting defaults - our coaching defaults, not from the video) Movement Targets Start (sets x reps) Your notes Backward walk / sled drag Front-of-knee, quads 2 x 1-2 min Tibialis (wall shin) raise Tibialis anterior 2 x 15-25 ATG split squat (assisted) Knee flexion, glutes, VMO 2 x 6-10 / side Slant-board squat (heels up) Quads, patellar tendon 2 x 8-12 Nordic curl (assisted) Hamstrings (eccentric) 2 x 3-6 PROGRESSION RULE + SCALING Step Regress (easier) Progress (harder) Range Shorten depth; more hand support Add depth once pain-free Load Bodyweight / band assist Add light load or sled weight When to advance Hold if pain rises or reps stall Top of rep range, pain-free for 2 sessions HOW TO USE: Run as a warm-up before the main session. Start at a range/assist level the client fully controls, keep it pain-free, advance one variable at a time. Adjust to the individual and defer to any physio guidance the client is already under.
Knee-resilience training for clients - FAQ
Is it bad for your knees to let them go past your toes?
This is the rule Ben Patrick built his coaching around challenging. The blanket 'never let your knees pass your toes' cue was always an oversimplification - in real life, walking downstairs, squatting to the floor and sprinting all send the knee well past the toes. His position is that the knee should be progressively loaded through its full range, starting light and building up, so it becomes strong and resilient in the positions people were told to avoid. For a coach, the practical read isn't 'knees over toes is always good' - it's that the joint gets stronger when you train the range gradually rather than permanently avoiding it.
What exercises does the Knees Over Toes Guy recommend?
Ben Patrick's signature progressions center on a handful of movements: backward walking or backward sled drags, tibialis (shin) raises, ATG split squats, heels-elevated slant-board squats, and Nordic curls. The common thread is loading the knee and the muscles around it - especially the often-neglected tibialis and the tissue at the front of the knee - through a controlled, progressively increasing range. Most of them can be scaled to bodyweight or done with minimal equipment, which is what makes them easy to drop into a client's warm-up regardless of their setup.
Can you do knee-strengthening work without a sled or special equipment?
Yes, and that portability is a big part of why the approach spread. Backward walking can be done on a treadmill or just walking backward down a flat stretch; tibialis raises can be done leaning against a wall; split squats and slant-board squats need only your bodyweight and a slight incline (a rolled mat or a wedge works to start). The load comes from range of motion and gradual progression, not necessarily heavy weight - which means a coach can prescribe the block to a home-based or travelling client and still get a real training effect.
Who should be doing knee-prep work like this?
The strongest fit is exactly the client base coaches struggle to program around: desk-bound clients with stiff, achey knees, older clients worried about longevity, runners and field-sport athletes managing repetitive load, and anyone returning from a knee issue who has been cleared to train. It works well as a standard warm-up block rather than a rehab program - for genuine injury or post-surgical cases the client should be under the care of a physio or physician, and the coach's job is to reinforce, not replace, that guidance. Used as prehab, a few minutes of this before the main session is low-risk and easy to keep consistent.
More training-science breakdowns
- · What is corrective exercise - where prehab work like this fits in a client's program.
- · Exercises for deconditioned clients - meeting stiff, load-shy clients where they are.
- · The full roundup: fitness YouTubers coaches should study.
Keep dialing in joint-friendly programming
all guidesWhat Is Corrective Exercise? A Coach's Guide (2026)
Corrective exercise is movement-quality coaching for healthy clients, not treatment. What it honestly looks like in practice, the fair critique of the corrective industry, and the refer-out line every coach holds.
Read the guideExercises for Deconditioned Clients: A Coach's Guide (2026)
Deconditioned describes lost fitness, not body size. A non-humiliating first-session assessment, an entry-to-progression exercise table across eight movement patterns, RPE-capped programming, and the medical-clearance line every coach holds.
Read the guideExercise Progression and Regression for Coaches (2026)
Progression is the smallest change that keeps a client adapting; regression is the respectful step back that keeps them training. The nine progression variables, pattern ladders for six movements, and the decision rules for when to move.
Read the guideFree tools for this: One-Rep-Max Calculator · Warm-Up Set Calculator · Protein Calculator
Build the prehab block once, reuse it across every client
A knee-prep decision only pays off if you can deliver it without rebuilding a warm-up per client. Coachway's workout builder lets you template your knee-prep block with a demo video on every movement, assign it in seconds, and set per-client starting ranges - while clients log each session and you track pain and reps through check-ins so you can see it's actually working. Start your 14-day free trial and program your first joint-friendly roster from one screen.
