I had an athlete injury his quad about midway between his hip and knee (Rectus Femoralis). He complains of tightness and the muscle is sensitive to touch, no visible bruising or swelling although the muscle does feel “tighter” or more tensed than the other leg. He says it is painful to run at full speed, although he ran at a meet last week with this problem and ran a pr in the 100 and 200. He says he feels no pain during tempo runs and block starts at 70-75%. Also, squatting with very heavy weight (3 sets of 3 at 95%) did not hurt him either. This seems unusual to me that he has mild muscle strain that is sensitive to touch but does not decrease his speed or strength. Is this something else? Anyone have any advice on rehab, etc? Thanks
Try to start to work on his ham and TFL.
An ultrasound scan can be useful.
I had a rectus femoris strain before, and since the muscle also works as a hip flexor, you might not feel it work in that action until your running closer to your actual sprint speed. I could also squat heavy and jog, because your not really working hip flexion aspect of the rectus femoris. I also did not really notice any loss of strength or speed, but since the muscle hurt when I was sprinting, I couldn’t really sprint much, so it was hindering my progress. I’m sure if he works through it untreated, the grade of strain could worsen, and then minor loss of function may occur.
I had to to take some time off myself, and my injury happened because I had very tight rectus femoris and I think I overworked the muscle too early in season. I just improved my warm-up, gradually increase volume now and improve flexibility of hip flexors. Still gets tight, but no pain, I just watch for it, and adjust accordingly, no problems since.