T Nation

Right Hamstring and Left Hip

Injuries and Rehab
#1

I’ve got two issues to throw out to people here to see if anyone has had or heard of anything similar.

Right hamstring: For some reason, during the eccentric portion of a deadlift, even when getting into position, about halfway down, my right hamstring almost feels like it catches. I’m not really sure how else to describe it. The feeling’s right in the middle of the hamstring, so not near any joints, and really localized. It doesn’t really hurt, but is more of a weird feeling. I’ve had it for years and have deadlifted mid-400’s with it and it doesn’t affect the concentric at all. The main issue, apart from being a little disconcerting, is that I tend to shift to the left when lowering the weight, which isn’t great.

Left hip: Starting about two weeks ago, I’ve been getting a sharp pain/pinching in my hip. It doesn’t feel like a muscle strain. I immediately thought about an impingement, but there’s no pain during flexion. Rather, it occurs mainly with extension and with weight bearing. It’s also only occasional and a movement may be good 10 times, but cause pain the 11th, then be good again. I’m thinking this doesn’t rule out an impingement, but most things I read point to flexion based pain.

I’m going to work on some mobility for my hips over the next couple of weeks to see if that improves my hip before getting it checked out. For my hamstring, because it’s so specific, it’s really easy to work around, if I really want to.

Does anyone have any thoughts about either?

Thanks!

#2

If you want to try and work it out yourself you could look up superficial backline, spiral line and lateral line. The images will show you the pathways along which the muscles connect to perform movement. If you massage along the path of where the pain/discomfort is you may find tension or something that needs to be worked out. It’s probably not your hip or hamstring. That is likely what is compensating for a problem somewhere else.

It also could be a general tissue (muscle, connective, neural, epithelial) issue or movement/form issue.

#3

Thanks for the assist with the title formatting @Chris_Colucci !

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#4

Thanks, damo. There definitely could be something in play somewhere else and I’m working on overall mobility. Apart from dismal hip internal rotation, my overall mobility isn’t relatively too bad. For example, I can overhead press pain free and sit in a full squat in flat shoes. I have a feeling my hamstrings may fall into the general tissue/movement category you mentioned.

I should have put this in my first email, but the “catch” happens with a specific movement pattern, when my hamstrings are shortening at the knee and extending at the hip in a close stance. It doesn’t appear during good mornings or RDLs, when my knee angle is pretty much fixed, or during squats, with my feet further apart. I’m wondering if there’s some sort of coordination issue in play.

I also called it “hamstring” instead of “hamstrings” in my title/initial post, because I feel it just in the biceps femoris, but I guess that’s really two muscles, so should have been plural anyway…

#5

Is this at the front of your hip?

#6

I’d say about halfway between the front and the groin area. Definitely not right in the front, like a hip flexor strain. I’ve also strained my hip flexors and adductors over the years and it does really act or feel like any muscle injury I’ve had.

#7

It’s most likely a labral tear. I wouldn’t sweat it much, up to 80% of athletes have torn hip labrums without significant impact on function

Work in improving your hip IR and closed-chain stability. I recommend a hip airplane where you focus on turning toward the working leg, lengthening the glute, rather than turning away from the working leg as is conventional practice

#8

That makes a lot of sense. I had been focusing on FAI, but was thrown off because the symptoms don’t really fit. I’m not disregarding it, but I’m not convinced it’s the cause of the current issue.

A possibly torn labrum seems more likely. The symptoms seem to fit that better and after decades of basketball, flag football, running, and training, it wouldn’t be a surprise. After you mentioned it, I remembered a possible mechanism of injury for the current issue. About two weeks ago, I was out for a run and stepped on the edge of a pot hole. My ankle went over, but I saved a sprain because my knee and hip also went moved, limiting the stress to my ankle. My hip didn’t hurt until a day or so later, so I thought it was a coincidence, but maybe there was something there.

The pain is just occasional, not terribly bad, and doesn’t affect any normal day to day activities, so I’m not planning on getting it checked out right away. I’m going to give it a week or two and do some mobility work and low intensity exercises, like the hip airplane you mentioned, and see if it gets worse, better, or stays the same.

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#9

To be honest, you can train as normal with a labral tear. I’ve torn both but my training doesn’t reflect it.

As long as you do some dynamic hip stability work and work on recapturing hip IR on top of training, your should be good to go

#10

That’s awesome, I really appreciate it. My hip IR sucks, so I definitely need to work on that.

Lucky enough, I was due for a deload, so I’ve dropped squats, DLs, etc for the week to see how things feel. Over the past couple of weeks, squats and DLs didn’t seem to bother it at all, so I should be able to work them back in next week. Interestingly, bench was the worst for it. I think it had to do with being in hip extension, then getting tight.

I went skating for about 20 mins today (the kids really wanted to go) and it definitely triggered it. Nothing that stopped me, just a dull ache. Probably, like bench, hip extension plus a high stability demand. Maybe this is just showing me how weak my hips actually are and that I need to start adding in some work, like airplanes, mini band walks, etc to strengthen the muscles.

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#11

Skating places the hip into extension, abduction and external rotation, which, unfortunately, is one of the two position that most irritates the labrum

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#12

For sure. I really appreciate all of your advice/suggestions. Even though it’s almost impossible to definitively identify a specific injury over the internet and I’d probably have to see someone in person to get that, you’ve at least pointed me in a good, logical, direction and I can work some of the suggestions you made. Fingers crossed, it improves or at least doesn’t interfere with training and at worst, it goes the opposite direction and I go get checked out.

I like to try to fix myself as much as possible. I’ve had enough experiences going to a professional, only to have them tell me to do what I already knew and was doing, that I like to exhaust my own efforts first. At least I can then tell them what hasn’t worked.

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