I’ve been told that I have extremely tight hamstrings. Why is this undesirable? I thought that muscles were supposed to be tight, in a sense. What could have caused this?
Muscles should be tight, but “tight hamstrings” implies a loss of flexibility. These have been associated with knee pain (patellofemoral syndrome and pes anserine bursitis), back problems (hyperlordosis, lower back pain), poor posture during sitting (posterior pelvic tilit) and running injuries. Stretching before exercise and diathermy (heating) are thought to help. A Google search for “tight hamstrings” will turn up plenty of other info.
I know someone with short hamstrings, and they cannot touch their toes because of it. They inherited it. They have to be careful with stretching lest they tear a hamstring, but otherwise they can function normally. Is that the same things as tight hamstrings?
Is there any way to combat these? My personal trainer told me that I have tight (read: inflexible, I guess) hamstrings. Most stretches end up putting too much pressure on my knees, causing them to cramp. Incidentally, I’m 22 years old.
Oh, and touching my toes is out of the question. Either I’m the stiffest man alive, or my arms are unusually short (though my wingspan nearly matches my height, 6’1).
If the stretches are having that effect then you are overstretching. Gaining flexibility in hamstrings is a really long-term project - it’s not going to happen in a couple of weeks.
Unfortunately, like many things related to fitness and health, you need to do a little bit often rather than a lot all at once. Gradually the flexibility will improve. The extent of improvement will depend on factors such as age (which isn’t a problem in your case), severity of tightness, how lucky you were in the genetic lottery, etc.
I’m not sure if this is still conventional wisdom, but when I was training the stretching books said that stretches for hamstrings, Achilles tendons, etc. should be held for longer than stretches for muscles. Hopefully someone with more current knowledge will confirm or debunk this.
IMHO, the best stretch for hamstrings is a yoga pose called Downward-Facing Dog. I give it credit for lengthening my hamstrings. I never used to be able to touch my toes; now I can do so easily and can even rest my forehead on my knee when I’m properly warmed up.
The usual stretches for hamstrings, like bending to touch your toes, put a lot of compression on the discs your lower back if you have tight hamstrings.
Another stretch that can lengthen your hamstrings without messing up your back is the one where you lie on your back and raise your leg, but if your hamstrings are short, you really need to use a strap.
As Lord Mondgreen says, this is not something that will improve quickly. You will work on it for a looong time before you see any gains–but when improvement comes, it tends to be sudden and dramatic, at least for me. You just have to stick with it.
I suffer from this. The hamstrings in my legs are very tight, and I have limited flexibility.
It gave me another problem, so I had to go into physical therapy for it. Every day, I’m supposed to apply heat packs and then do various stretching exercises to try to loosen them, but my physical therapist said I’ll never be really flexible-- it’s just the way I’m made.
I second what Podkayne said about the stretching on your back.
Don’t go too far too fast. You want to feel the stretch, but don’t cross over the line between discomfort and pain. Do your set of, say, ten reps twice a day. You might go for a week or more with no apparent improvement, but don’t give up. Flexibility comes slowly.
l’m glad someone asked about this.
My hamstrings are very tight too, in spite of my otherwise freakish flexiblity. I’m sitting in cobbler’s pose in my chair right now, but no way could I do a comfortable forward fold.
Since heat is helpful for stretching would the effect have long term benefits, or will the hamstrings only be looser while they are warm?
How long is recommended for holding a stretch or pose?
Every session of P/T I’ve ever gone through has included some sort of light warm up before stretching. 5-10 minutes on a stationary bike at an easy pace usually.
You can build up towards touching your toes, just bend forward as far as you can gently. Try and bend at the waste and don’t curve your spine into the bend, imagine there is a weight at your chestand allow your chest to move forward and down as far as it can, keep the position for a few seconds and then straighten up again.
Other hamstring effecting exercises are to standing upright slowly push down with the balls of your feet until you are standing on tip-toes (don’t do the ballet thing of standing on the points of your toes, keep the weight on the balls of your feet). Then slowly lower your heels down again and then slowly raise your toes and ballse of your feet off the ground so you are standing on your heels, finaly let your toes down again till your feet are flat.
Another good hamstring exercise if to stand facing a wall about 4 feet in front of you. Take a step forward with one foot till it is inches from the wall, lower your hips at the same time and place your hands ahead of you at shoulder height on the wall. You should fell a slight pull on the hamstrings of the rear leg. Now gently lower your hips and move them forward slightly whilst bending the front leg’s knee, this should increase the stretch on the hamstring of the rear leg. Do this gently and slowly, gradually increasing the stretch applied to the rear leg’s hamstring. Then swap legs to do the same thing.
Tight hamstrings can also cause other problems.
Around ten years ago, I started waking up in the mornings with horrible lower back pain. I tried everything - different beds, stretches, exercises, yoga, you name it, always trying to loosen up my back. I went to the doctor to rule out physical damage (there was none). It wasn’t debilitating pain, but it was annoying and, well, painful.
A couple of years ago, something clicked in my head, and I started focusing on stretches that loosened my hamstrings. Instead of doing 5 or 10 minutes of stretches focuses on my back, I’d focus on legs and hamstrings.
Voila. Pain gone.
Note that my hamstrings never hurt. It was always my lower back. But there’s something related, because loose hamstrings = no back pain, at least for me.
Stretching and therapy:
http://orthodoc.aaos.org/khanna/physical.htm
http://www.ptjournal.org/abstracts/pt2003/abstractsPt2003.cfm?pubNo=PL-RR-163-F
Links to other diseases: