I did these early in the evening yesterday and felt fine after doing them. My ME set was a smidge off because I let the bar get a little too far in front of me. Still feeling good so I continued the workout.
Well… several hours later right above my left glute I have this pain that won’t let me put my back in flexion especially while sitting without pain. I do some foam rolling and tennis ball work on my legs and and hips and do some hip flexor, hip, and hamstring stretches… helps a tiny bit but not to much.
Then I go to pick something up, left on ground, right foot in air behind my hips and I feel something in my hamstrings pop and the pain is almost completely gone…
Does anybody know what might have happened and what I can do to keep this from happening again?
I am not a physio or doctor of any kind, but I’ve had similar experience. I tweak something in my back, hard to breathe or rotate and when I roll on a PVC pipe, my spine crunches back into place and I am back to normal. Given this, my guess is that some nerve was impinged and when you bent over, whatever was impinging got popped back into the correct place. The “pop” can actually radiate pretty far along your bones so you may have felt it in your hamstring while it originated further up. Pain can also radiate away from the injury site with this kind of thing.
Hope you stay injury free.
Hmm… makes sense, but what can I do to stop this from happening again. At the time, it was so painful I thought I wouldn’t be dl’ing for quite a few weeks…
What I’m doing now:
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regular foam rolling.
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regular stretchig
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some ab/ad-ductor work, but not regularly
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some, but not regular unilateral leg work (for hip problems, I’ve heard it can exacerbate the problem)
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back extensions (no access to a reverse hyper, anyone know how to rig one up in a commercial gym?)
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glucosamine+fish oil
[quote]Fletch1986 wrote:
- back extensions (no access to a reverse hyper, anyone know how to rig one up in a commercial gym?)
[/quote]
No comment about the other stuff but try doing hypers against mini bands. By pushing with your knees against the pad (like on a ghr) it kind of works similar to ghrs. tears my hammies up
[quote]TechnoViking wrote:
I am not a physio or doctor of any kind, but I’ve had similar experience. I tweak something in my back, hard to breathe or rotate and when I roll on a PVC pipe, my spine crunches back into place and I am back to normal. Given this, my guess is that some nerve was impinged and when you bent over, whatever was impinging got popped back into the correct place. The “pop” can actually radiate pretty far along your bones so you may have felt it in your hamstring while it originated further up. Pain can also radiate away from the injury site with this kind of thing.
Hope you stay injury free. [/quote]
OFF TOPIC
Where you live bra? It’s rare to see another CT guy in here.
New Haven. Love the avatar blacklabel.
OP, in terms of prevention I’m not sure what to say other than “life carefully”. However, I’ve lurked on this site long enough to know that T-nationers don’t really go half assed. Part of the game is pushing yourself to the limit no? We all love it, but with it comes the few times that the bar drifts a little to far forward and something gets tweaked. Of course balanced training is important, but I assume that you’re good on this front. Heal up, rehab, and keep at it Fletch!
Edit: “lift carefully”
^
Hmm… I was afraid of that… Guess I’ll just keep on pushing since nothing’s hurt now, or pulling in this case.
you have to be very careful during any partial lift. you have to think about what position your body is in at THAT point during a full ROM lift. then you have to set up in THAT position to initiate the lift. often times when doing rack pulls people initiate the lift only with their backs. they round immidiately and injuries happen. also, be sure not to jerk the bar from the starting position. starting in part of a stroke really needs care by getting all the slack out of the bar.
it would be very helpful to see a video of your midshin pull with the weight that this happened with.
Does anyone else find mid shin pulls harder than pulls from the floor? I have a 20 pound difference.
Most people find it harder so yes.
I made damned sure to pull the slack out of the bar. Basically, as soon as I broke the bar from the pins my hips shot up, the bar drifted forward, I lost all ham and quad recruitment and I was using all hips and back.
On second thought, I think I’m just going to ditch the exercise all together. Last time I ME’d on this exercise, I got a minor groin strain. I’ll stick to deficit dead’s, band deads, above the knee rack deads, and switch between conventional and sumo as far as ME deadlift variations goes.
Also try out ME gm’s from the pins. Are gm’s from pins best done for an ME of 3 or can I do an ME single.
I second ditching it as a ME, use it as an accessory. Sit back before you pull, just like you would be during a normal deadlift. It should drag up your thighs just like the deadlift should ideally.
Happy lifting bud.
Hmmm… maybe use it as a supp after doing an ME squat variation that uses a load well below my ME power squat… (like front squats, deep Zercher squats, front box squats)
Oh and thanx everyone.
[quote]DixiesFinest wrote:
I second ditching it as a ME, use it as an accessory. Sit back before you pull, just like you would be during a normal deadlift. It should drag up your thighs just like the deadlift should ideally.
Happy lifting bud.[/quote]
I did it just like it, or tried anyway. And my shins and lower thighs were pretty raw after the session so that’s some biofeedback telling me I did something right (obviously not everything). The problem is do to especially weak hammies and somewhat weak quads while having relatively strong hips and back. Time to work in some deficit work and focused hamstring supps.
I’m thinking sumo and conventional deficit deads, some band dead’s to help explode off the floor and front box squat. Work on sldl’s with more focus on the mind-muscle connection to my hams than the weight, band leg curls, narrow high leg presses. No access to ghr and tried them in the lat pull down machine with no luck. Maybe some narrow stance, toe elevated gm’s.
Hey Fletch,
I really like snatch grip deadlifts and swiss ball hamstring curls. The SB ham curls don’t really put a lot of tension on the hams, but definitely activate them to work across both the knee and hip joints, like a GHR would. I suppose you could really add some weight doing barbell hip bridges (Bret Contreras’ article “dispelling the glute myth” is a good read on this), although it’s just not quite the same movement.
Cheers and keep up the intensity!
Yep. Single leg reps are a bit more difficult in terms of keeping the knee, hip, and trunk stable. Concentrate on driving your hips up to the ceiling. I love this exercise.
Edit: I really like Joe Defranco’s stuff too. The most dominant rugby season I had was after coming off of his WS4SB program. Great because there’s a lot of unilateral leg work and lots of rear delt/rotator cuff work.
