First, you definitely have some of the best quads on PMF.
Second, I also did heavy barbell squats for many years with zero knee issues.
I really don’t have a strong opinion about knee wraps. I switched from knee wraps to sleeves after reading several articles like the one below.
A recent study in
The Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research found that squatting in knee wraps leads to a nearly 20 percent decline in quad muscle activation. That’s because the wraps essentially “take over,” doing the job of your quads.
That decrease in muscle activation actually makes your workout less effective from a muscle growth and fat loss standpoint, says Kechijian.
“You should also generally train in a way that’s specific to your sport,” says Kechijian. “You’d never wear knee wraps out on the court, course, or field. So why train in them?”
In fact, habitual use of them could even set you up for injury.
“Wearing wraps all the time could potentially cause you to lose some of the stability you’d normally have in your knee,” he says. “Then when you don’t wear the wraps and do something athletic, that knee stability isn’t there and you could get injured.”
(Learn
The Secrets to the Perfect Squatto avoid injury and build more muscle.)
So unless you’re training for a weightlifting competition, don’t use wraps. Even if you are training for a competition, make sure to cycle in some squats where you don’t use them, to help maintain stability in your knee joint.