On Dec 9th, I got a slight pull in my right hamstring warming up, there must have been some underlying issues to have caused that. Since then it took me a while to get it sorted back to the point I was in spikes on the track again. The site of the original tear feels fine now, but in the middle of last week I was experiencing some discomfort more medially, and higher towards the origin. I saw a masseur and he said he thought it was the gracillis. Would this be simply the gracillis over compensating for a weakness in the hamstring? I have gone through the processes of hot and cold treatments, have used EMS on the TENS and massage settings. Is there anything else I can do? I feel that leading up to last week I may have been overstretching the area, and it seemed that my flexibility was as good as ever, so I’m not sure a lot of stretching is the answer. I’m just about convinced there’s no tear as I can stride reasonably quickly, say 80% and that’s not really a problem, but it just seems very tight.
Do you have checked this problem with a strumental examination (MRI) ?
I haven’t had a scan no. The problem with that is the cost/the waiting. Here in Britain we have the NHS, which is free health care, but there are long waiting lists for things. Alternatively you can go private, but as a post grad student, with no funding it’s not really an option. Thanks for the response though.
Try to work on you quad doing stretching (static/PNF), hypertonic quads can give much problems to hams.
Then do light stretch (microstretching) on you ham/adductor groups (for micro info search on the forum).
Does Masseur have done only a diagnosis or have treated you too?
ok cool, i will pay more attention to the quads, and do a search for my stretching. i have also tried doing some neural stretches and sciatic mobilisation techniques. the masseur treated me also, but this is over 3 weeks ago now! just had a massage now, and i feel a lot better in fact. i think i might be bruised a little in the morning, but i should be ok after that’s dealt with!
i just searched for micro stretching on the forum, and there was a link that came up 3 or 4 times, but every time i went to it it never worked. it was a geocities link, and it comes up with a yahoo site saying the page i’m looking for can’t be accessed. are there any other links available, cos i really have no clue what micro stretching is. i found another link regarding stretching, but no information on microstretching. sorry, because i know we do need to find out the information ourselves, but i have tried, just failed miserably!!
Ok, do a light stretch for 1 minutes at 30% of range of motion.
Sometime i do a progressive stretching, starting from 15°, then 30°, then 45°, 60° and sometime if there isn’t pain, full joint angle, for 1 minutes for position, this work well and in a progressive manner fascia and muscles.
thanks for the feedback! appreciated!
A great stretch for the Gracilis;
Get down on hands and knees (quadruped position)
Spread knees apart.
Fore-arms and hands rest on ground as do knees and feet.
I love this stretch.
The gracilic muscle is a synergist to the hammies, to be relevant to your first post.
ahh cool, thanks, i shall try it later on when i am doing my stretching.
As if you don’t do this stretch anyway…away from the track… (While watching Neighbours and dreaming of Harold) lol lol 
Whats going on Maris…U cool? Still asking loads of questions I see!
Invest in a booked Sports Stretch…You can buy it from Borders for about £10-12.
Its got specific stretches for all sports and details on specific stretches for a particular body part.
Neighbours gets me through the day mate!!! I’m good man, how are you? The best way to learn is to ask questions I reckon. I haven’t tried this stretch yet though, will do later though! How’s things with you? Fit yet?
Fit yes…injury free…No…gutted. I was shape this indoors to run very fast…thats how it goes sometimes…
think of it as a blessing in disguise for outdoors mate
High resolution Ultra Sound works well for muscle problems and costs less than a tenth as much as an MRI. See if you can get one. (80 to 100 dollars here)
How do the board members here deal with neural problems? Thats what my one is…its not muscular. I started to get cramp/severe tightness in my Bicep Fem at top end…initially i thought it was a pull…I do neural stretches everyday to get on top of the ‘injury’…just wanted to get other members views/tips on this subject…
Make sure you get manual therapy to break up any adhesions etc before you try to stretch it out. “Stretch it out” is often the advice of lazy therapist who don’t want to sweat. If the problem stil exists deep down, the stretching may cause a rebound reaction and tighten the area further, leading to the therapist diagnosing “Sciatica”.
Fantastic Charlie thanks…Thats exactly what happened the 2nd time (2 weeks ago) The first time was 4 weeks ago. I was fine after week 3…had a low key comp and all was fine…What I should have done was to have kept on getting the area deep tissue massaged still. (which I didn’t) The prescribed stretching caused a rebound effect bring the neural tightness back in my 2nd race and putting me out for an additional 2 weeks.
Charlie while I’ve got your attention, what would the effect of EMS work do to a ‘neural hamstring’? Is it advised that I still do my EMS programme why ‘rehabilitating’ the hammie? Or is this too much stress on that area coupled with general rehab work on the swiss ball and in the weights room?
I must say that I’m now a disciple of EMS especially after I was out for 3 weeks. (a slight mis-diagnosis of my injury…I’ve been told that neural hams with severe cramp are very similar to the sympthoms of a grade 1 pull) Having stuck with the EMS programme on Strength Building mode, I was able to step straight back into the weights room and front squat 120kg for 3 like I was never away.
Yes, you can keep the EMS going on all other muscles but I’d just use a pulsing mode on the affected Hamstring till it’s worked free of any adhesions. ART or other form of deep tissue work should have it freed up in a week at most. Use weights that don’t affect the ham to maintain a crossover effect to the entire body (bench, incline, pull-downs, etc. Don’t worry, it will quickly come back to full strength, as you’ve already noticed.
Thanks for that Charlie…I’ve been working out the adhesions myself with self massage using a golf ball. Everyday…nothing too aggressive…just enough to mimick the effect of say a thumb or elbow going in (on some days I’d go a little deeper again to mimick a deeper massage). It seem to be working very well.
I went slightly against the grain with the suggestion of not doing any hamstring related work simply because the problem I’m having isn’t muscular. I’ve managed to do ham curls (single leg and double) ,some single leg eccentric hamcurls and some dead lifting. All of which have been ok.