Is there anything worse than a pulled hamstring?

Yes, pulled hamstring recovery.

Hamstrings injuries are a very difficult to recover from because they are responsible for so much in our everyday movement. A pulled hamstring is also an injury that has a high likelihood of re-injury if you don’t fully heal before re-starting your activity.

Now, enough with the doom and gloom, right? You can recover from your pulled hamstring and we’re going to help you do it! Let’s take a look at the path to recovery…

First, we should identify the severity of the injury:


 

Grade 1 – Moderate Pull

  • Tightness in the area of the strained muscle
  • Mild to moderate discomfort when performing movements that stretch the strained muscle fibers
  • minor swelling or inflammation

Grade 2 – Severe Pull

  • Twinges of pain during activity, especially against resistance
  • Visible swelling and pressure, with the possibility of bruising
  • Weakness in the affected muscle

Grade 3 – Full Rupture

  • Significantly diminished motor function, making motions that use the affected muscles difficult or not possible
  • Severe pain when contracting the muscles, and a high level of background pain
  • Visible and immediate swelling, with the possibility of bruising

Obviously, the more severe the injury the more time and work it’s going to take to recover. Be honest with yourself about your pain, swelling, and mobility when trying to figure out where you land on this scale. It’s important to identify correctly where you’re at so you can treat accordingly. If you need help identifying the severity of your injury and want some tailored suggestions, take our FREE Injury Assessment and our injury specialists will provide you with custom suggestions!

Free-Assessment

Now it’s time to start the recovery process.

RICE

We’ve all heard the acronym, but most athletes overuse the process. Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevation is great, but should be a focus only in the first 24 hours. After that time, RICE, and ice in particular, actually impedes the progress of healing. Utilize the standard RICE immediately after the injury, but discontinue once the swelling has subsided.

Heat

Heat is an injury’s best friend. After the first 24 hours or so and once the swelling has subsided, it’s important to start treating with heat. Good circulation is incredibly important to a quick recovery because it will help to repair the damage and remove toxins that are in the affected area. Using heat is an effective way to increase circulation to the injured hamstring.

Treatment Kits

Expecting your body to completely heal on it’s own quickly is not a realistic expectation. That’s why we like to give our bodies a jumpstart with the QiVantage Injury Treatment Kits. The kits are specifically designed to help your body reduce inflammation, repair damage, and remove toxins faster than the body can on it’s own, or even when utilizing standard methods. For minor tweaks, use the Recovery Starter/Mild Kit. Grade 1 pulls, you should be good with Moderate kit depending on the severity of your injury and how quickly you want to heal. For Grade 2 pulls, you’ll definitely want at least the Severe kit and for nagging or chronic injuries, you’ll want the Nagging kit.

Injury Treatment Kits

Stretching & Strengthening

Once swelling and pain have subsided, it’s time to start stretching and strengthening the hamstring. It’s important that if you start to feel extra pain to stop or lighten the activity. You’ll end up doing more harm than good.

Hamstring Elongation

  1. Apply Recovery Spray to hamstring from your injury treatment kit.
  2. Arch the back, pulling back on the shoulders and pushing the chest out. This is very important.
  3. Lock one leg and bend the other, pulling back on the toes of the locked leg. Pulling back on the toes is also very important.
  4. Slowly lean towards the locked leg, breathing out. The concentration on this movement is arching the back backwards and pulling back on the toes of the locked leg. If this is done properly, it won’t be possible to bend over very far, but the entire back of the leg will be stretched remarkably well.

 

Lower Body Stretch Wall Stretch

  1. Apply Recovery Spray to hamstring from your injury treatment kit.
  2. Lay on the floor facing up in front of a wall.
  3. Bring the injured leg straight up and rest it on the wall.
  4. Move closer to the wall as you regain strength in the muscle. The closer you are to the wall, the better the stretch.

Weight & Strength Exercises

  1. It’s important to note that this should only be done once the pain is gone from the injured muscle. Gradually build up to this in order to have a smooth recovery.
  2. Start off light. Don’t assume you’ll be able to pick up where you normally are once the pain is gone.

 

Like we mentioned before, rushing back from a hamstring injury is likely a recipe for re-injury. While utilizing these tips and processes to help you recovery from your pulled hamstring, only return to full participation in your sport once there is no pain or weakness in the area.


Now that you’re on the path to recovery, let’s prevent them in the future! Check out our FREE Day-to-Day Muscle Recovery Checklist that will outline everything you should be doing pre-, during, and post-workout to keep your muscles in top shape. You don’t want to be referencing this blog post again later! Download it today!

Recovery Daily Checklist