New Balance athlete and former Sun Devil Fasil Bizuneh claimed his first USA Track and Field National Championship at 10 miles this morning in Flint, Michigan.

Bizuneh finished fourth overall in a time of 47:29.  That’s just under 4:45 per mile for those of you doing the math.

Here’s the local news coverage of the race.

Listen here for Bizuneh’s post race interview. Pay attention at :50 in to get a glimpse into the effort these athletes put into their work.

Good job Bizzy—and good luck in Chicago!

Today, Molly Huddle broke the American Record in the 5,000m at the Diamond League track meet in Brussels, Belgium. She ran a whopping time of 14:44.76.

Catch an interview with Molly on the flotrack website.

Additionally, Lisa Aguilera, a former AZ high school runner and ASU alum, ran a huge personal best in the 3,000m steeplechase. Her 9:24 ranks as the fifth fastest time in American history!  Catch Lisa’s interview here.

Congratulations to both!

How much do we really know about stretching?

USATF just published results of an extensive study on stretching.

The results?

A mixed bag as usual.

I’ll get a chance to check out the details a little later, but here’s a summary. A PDF of the study itself is also avaiable on their website.

www.usatf.org/news/view.aspx?duid=USATF_2010_08_20_12_13_14

Happy reading.

My buddy and I have been tag-teaming a few select patients lately.

It’s a good way to learn, re-enforce skills, and create what can be thought provoking exchanges.

It can also be pretty productive for the patient as well.

Anyways, we were working on one such patient just yesterday, and after we were done, my colleague asked an interesting question that sparked a blog idea.

Then I came home and read a couple blogs on very similar ideas, all posted in the last couple days—sometimes the world just works that way.

I’ll get to the question, but first a little background.

The patient is a pretty big guy. Way bigger than me and my buddy—combined.

Which—by virtue of sheer mass imbalance—happens to be the one surefire pre-qualifier for a two-on-one session.

Anyways, he’s a high level athlete, with lots of high level athlete problems—torn this, strained that, smashed those and surgery there, and there, and there.

You know routine stuff at that level.

Regardless of what his specific problem was, though, my rules remain the same. Normalize movement—by way of normalizing motions. (There is, believe it or not, a huge difference in that small distinction.)

We made some pretty cool changes in the previous visits, and on this day (Day 3 or so), he kept most of the improvements between sessions.

Which sparked my buddy’s question: “I was a little worried about increasing his range of motion that much last visit—could that create a situation where he could hurt himself if he’s moving too much?”

Translated: His knee hurt when we started, it was full of dysfunctional tissue, so he couldn’t/didn’t move it much, and if we made it so he could move it, would that allow him to hurt himself?

My answer: “I dunno. Yes and no—maybe?”

The real answer, though? Not likely.

Here’s why.

We have this thing called a brain.

It doesn’t like us to hurt. It also has parts that tell us how to move.

The parts that don’t like pain are older than the parts that tell us how to move. (Very, very, very simplified brain map—but still somewhat true.)

The parts that don’t like pain are more reflexive (stick your hand on a hot stove—you don’t have to think before pulling it away, do you?).

We can, override those reflexes if we choose to—you’d endure running through fire to save your son or daughters life wouldn’t you?—but we’ve got to have a really good reason to do so.

So, here’s what happens: We improve range of motion, because he needs to be able to move in full ranges of motion.

But, if moving into those ranges will cause him pain or further damage the knee, he isn’t likely going to use that range in his daily life until he can do it pain free. (How he is forced to move it during sport is another question entirely—and falls into the realm of the ATC/trainer.)

In short, you absolutely have to have the ability to move fully. Whether your brain lets you, is a whole different question.

PS I already see the questions coming: But what if you increase ROM drastically in an athlete and then they go back out on the field?

Two points:

1. If their range of motion was that limited, should they really be on the field in the first place?
2. If this is an athlete, with extremely high level body awareness, control and skill, how long would they really need to learn how to stabilize that new motion effectively?

Hamstrings can be a real pain in the butt...

Because we deal so often with such an active population, one of the most common complaints we see in the office is the high hamstring strain.

They can be a real pain in the butt–literally.

The symptoms are usually pretty consistent: pain deep in the gluteal region, sometimes into the ischial tuberosity region (people usually think of this as the “sit-bone”, usually described as a dull achy tightness.

Patients often complain of pulling and tension high in the hamstring and at the gluteal fold when bending over at the waist, or deep ache in the region of the ischial tuberosity when sitting—especially for extended periods.

The patient is usually involved in endurance or repetitive use sport (cycling, triathlon, biking), though just about anyone can develop this, and most report ongoing symptoms in the region for protracted periods of time.

They usually present to the office when the symptoms have progressed from being a nuisance only at the beginning of running to it hurting all the time.

Patients try everything: stretching, icing, heating, foam rolling, changing their stride, anti-inflammatories, manipulation, prolotherapy and rest—all with varying degrees of relief (usually temporary relief at best).

Most wonder why.

I wish I knew too.

Fact is, although we have a lot of information available on predicating factors and rehabilitation guidelines for acute hamstring strains, those of the chronic nature are much less understood.

For instance: acute hamstring strains occur more often at the muscle belly, involve the lateral hamstring group usually, can be tied to strength imbalances between the hamstring and quadriceps groups (albeit loosely) and may respond to preventative programming involving eccentric loading (negative training) exercises.

All that I know off the top of my head at 10 pm on a long Tuesday—and I could keep going.

On the other hand: chronic high hamstring strains seem to be tied to repetitive use.
Oh yeah, and they occur in people.

That’s about all I on that one.

Actually there is a bit more information to be aware of, for instance: stress reaction implications at the ischial tuberosity, degenerative changes occurring at the tendon and potential rehab protocols with eccentric loading (though the jury is till out on this one, even more that I previously thought), but all that would detract from my point.

.

The reality is, most people, therapists included just chalk it up to the pure repetitive nature of the sport(s).

Most people with these complaints present with a myriad of contributing dysfunctions—ranging from low back disorders, foot issues, knee issues, and of course my favorite the “weak hip syndrome.”—which also, by the way is why very few people effectively manage this themselves—there are just too many contributing factors to self treat.

But I’ve notice a trend—at least in those presenting to my office, in the last three months, seen by myself, on days that I paid attention, and I wrote it down afterwards—poor hip extension. (How was that for a qualifying statement?)

Almost to a person, regardless of what other contributing factors I’ve found in the development of the patient’s “high hamstring” complaint, restricted hip extension on the side of involvement was present.

And not just a little bit. Usually, it was more along the lines of barely being able to lie on their stomach and lift their leg off the table (or allow me to lift it, for that matter).

So I started thinking about it. And I came up with a theory.

Here it is:

Poor hip extension necessitates increased hamstring activation.

Because they can’t extend their hip, they can’t get their gluteals into an effective position to help “push” during running.

To make up for this deficit, they end up using their hamstring more than they really “should”.

Not because they want to, but rather because they have to.

Gotta get that five-miler in somehow, right?

How do you create a “chronic strain” or “high hamstring tendinosis?”

How about exceeding the capacity of the hamstring by asking it to do it’s part and make up for an ineffective gluteal group.

If the gluts wont’ push, then the hamstrings can pull even more!

That could do it.

(OK, so it’s not really a theory, but more just basic biomechanics really. I just didn’t realize how often I was seeing it until I stopped to think about it.)

P.S. People with restricted or limited hip extension tend to be the ones who look almost like they’re sitting down while they run instead of standing tall and leaning slighlty forward. Next time you see it, ask them how “tight” their hamstring are.