pulled hamstring or more?

[dynamo]

So about 3 weeks ago I pulled my hamstring sprinting from my car to the front door of the gym without any warm up, it was raining hard. I have been lightly stretching it in hopes of all being well come this week but its not.

I went to warm up on deads, I got up to 315 and as a SLDL my hamstring is fine, but when I lower my butt and try to get some hamstring activation, I feel like my hamstring, about midway up my leg, is going to rip apart. I can only describe the feeling as pulling on a dry rubber band until you feel and see it start to rip apart and pain. Once the pain starts it is there any time I try to use my hamstrings but doing normal things don't hurt it.

I did the stair climber for 10 minutes and my hamstrings felt tired but never felt the pain I did when trying to deadlift. I tried to do light RDLs after (135lbs) but the pain was too much to even do one rep.

So I am wondering, did I really pull it or is it torn? There is no inflammation or bruising, you wouldn't know I was having hamstring problems unless I told you. Should I vigorously stretch it and just do light hamstring work until I feel better or should I just not use it all and focus on everything else but my hams for a month or two? thanks.

edit: fyi foam rolling was excruciating on my leg btw

[drew]

Sounds like a tear, especially if it was that painful to foam roll. Was there any noticeable bruising? You should stop all activity on that leg immediately and get to a doctor to make sure you haven't done further damage. Rest, Ice, Elevate in the meantime and take some ibuprofen.

[dynamo]

nope no bruising at all, i'll call my doc up tomorrow, see what he says when i get there. FWIW No matter how hard I poke it there is no pain and unfortunately I don't have access to a foam roller on a regular basis so I don't know how it would feel now. I foamed rolled it the day after the incident last time. Thanks for your input.

[drew]

Sounds like you're on the way to recovery. Hamstrings can take a long time. I would still see the doc just to make sure there isn't further damage that you aren't seeing. I tore my quad back in november and it still feels sore when I do heavy squat or deadlift work.

[dynamo]

well, turns out I did everything wrong, I stayed off of it for 2 weeks, and I should've been doing light exercises, now I'm extremely tight, and need to work on the scar tissue. I'll take my time, with it. I just lifted using machines last night which was miserable, I ended up using light weights (10 pounds) and just to try to stretch it out a little bit. I'll be picking up some foam rollers and lacrosse balls to knead this scar tissue to oblivion.

[Travis Bell]

Bummer I didn't see this earlier. Hamstrings lock up really quick when there is a partial tear. The key is using light weight movements that keep the blood flow in there without exerting a lot of force that is going to make the tear worse.

It's going to be quite painful right now unfortunately but it'll get better with time. Don't go crazy with the stretching, gentle and just inside the pain threshold will help. If you get super agressive with it, it'll inflame some of the nerve endings surrounding the area which is just going to hurt more.

Hope this helps.

[dynamo]

that is quite helpful, thank Travis. I think i'll just try my normal routine but sub in light RDLs and supplement with dumb bell back exercises. I am usually all about the barbell, but I can't even do a bent over row without my hamstring locking up. So frustrating to see first hand how integrated the whole body is.

[Travis Bell]

I might stay away from DL's for awhile, more what I'm talking about is very light leg curls for sets of 50-100 reps. That sorta thing

Compound movements are probably not in your plan right now

[dynamo]

god damn it