[Scouse D]

Today, whilst heel hooking I felt a little twang in my hamstring just where it joins the buttock area.
As I write this it is getting bloody painful and stiff. The last one I had like this lingered for months. Any advice on how to look after it? Ice? heat?ibruprofen?

[tomtom]

Today, whilst heel hooking I felt a little twang in my hamstring just where it joins the buttock area.
As I write this it is getting bloody painful and stiff. The last one I had like this lingered for months. Any advice on how to look after it? Ice? heat?ibruprofen?

Rest, streching and vit i...

I get the same when I try the odd corner to the left of Morrells wall at da' Cliff (sorry random anecdote) and just avoid it now.. I've never done it any real harm - just stretched it in a way its never used to, so it cleared up smartish...

[Oldmanmatt]

I've had many a problem with hamstrings.
Rest and stretching.
Actually, the best defence is attack.
When it's healed lots of stretching and reverse leg raises.
I always stretch now, before climbing (warm first) and after.
Found that stretching in the warm up really seems to help prevent injury.
Uh, do I need to say, don't stretch cold?
For me, the typical injury was slipping a foot and hitting something a bit further down and suddenly loading the hamstring...
Twang!

[saltbeef]

i had a real issue with this when climbing in the cave alot a couple of years ago. right heel hooking then driving back to manc with foot on the gas. and then a hip subluxation (- terrifying) whilst on the double heel hooks of broken heart
as matt says - avoid exacerbating it ie don't heel hook for a bit. stretch it in a few days time, i think both active movements arond the joint as well as passive stretching help this.
i concede yoga might be a good way of doing this, as you do lots of movements in and out of positions that you wouldn't do if you were just sitting down stretching and trying to gauge what level of heel hooking won't hurt it is going to be pretty hard. pilates might work seeiing as its supposed to be for rehabilitating ballet dancers but i've no knowledge of this.
ibuprofen won't hurt
i doubt you will be able to ice where the tendon inserts into your bum as it'll be too deep. sounds like you partially torn something so i'd avoid heat in the short term as it will just promote inflammation.
as you say what a pain in the arse

[The Sausage]

What Foley says...
...the thing you have to remember, is that the hamstrings are designed to exactly the opposite of what we use them for, i.e. large amplitude, low load movements - basically bringing the foot from behind you to in front of you so you can take another step. The insertion is tiny. This means that it takes a long time before you can really use it again with any oomph.
As Saltbeef says, you must start to stretch into the pain and load it from quite early on. Really within the first two weeks, depending on how sore it is. It IS  going to be painful, but you have to tread the boundary between hurt and harm. Build up the load gradually and monitor how it feels the next day. A good exercise is to sit on a tea tray or plastic bag, and pull yourself across the floor in a sitting position by dragging yourself with your feet. Start by using your hands to help to reduce the load on your hamstrings.
It's likely to take a year before you can heel hook pain free.

[Boredboy]

I've had a couple of those (pretty odd sensation when it happened), both from heel hooking and they both took a few months to get better properly. One was highball bouldering in the snow, grim. Was out climbing pretty much straight away but struggled to pull in on my toes and heel for a while due to pain in the backside, seemed a pretty specific injury though so could climb lots of other stuff! 

[Scouse D]

i've actually climbed twice on it since injuring and as you say it's totally fine in many situations but you know about it if you try to use it. Reassuring to know you got better quite quickly.

[T_B]

Over 2 years now since I did mine heelhooking on Cemetary Waits on a freezing day. It still causes me discomfort, especially driving any long distances. I guess it's what you call a chronic injury?

Any tips on how I might sort this out, or will it plague me forever?

I had physio at the time, but never really did many exercises for it. I was heelhooking again pretty quickly, so definitely stressed it (but without re-injuring), but I reckon it's now maybe 50% as strong heelhooking.

The bit I tore is right where it enters the bone at the very top.

Pain in the...

[slackline]

Maybe the physio exercises will help? 

[hamsforlegs]

Depends exactly what you've done. I produced a 'pistol crack' hooking on something grotty at Burbage about two years ago. I had the same arse/deep-in-the-hip pain. I was lucky enough to have access to world-class sports med for nowt and got the following advice:

- Probably a partial rupture of the attachment of the ligament to the pelvis (ultrasound couldn't show enough detail to confirm).
- Rest the muscle; avoid any loading, and even avoid too much walking if painful at first
- DON'T STRETCH until all pain has ceased; if the damage is to the ligament you need to allow some scar tissue to build up
- Rehab the muscle with light loaded work and range of motion once pain stops
- Once totally sorted, start to build some defences by improving the co-ordination and strength of particular movement patterns (ie to spread the load across a range of muscles and ligaments if possible).

Obviously YMMV in general, and in particular if the damage is to the 'belly' of the muscle rather than the ligament; you can apparently tell if you've done this as you can literally feel the gap where you have damaged it.

My arse hurt when sitting for long periods until about 18 months after the injury. It's just about gone now, and I only notice it when shoe-horned into a kayak for any time.

It's bloody annoying and requires persistence to properly address. I do a lot of running (probably well over 3000 miles since the injury) so was well motivated to sort out the problem, but I am now probably much stronger when hooking. Always a bit wary though...

[Boredboy]

Hey T_B

I did my left hamstring on Cemetery Waits and my right hamstring pulling out of the Key Hole cave on some piece of shit desperate one move wonder, thought something had prolapsed when that happened! Both took a while (6 months) to get right but certainly didn't have the problems your having, the advice above seems spot on to me. Some heat, deep massage and stretching may also help along with progressive loading exercises? But you've got to put in the rehab time to see if it's going to get better.

 

[kingholmesy]

I sustained a very similar injury heel hooking on a problem at Bowden Doors - reached for a hold with my hand, missed it so pulled extra hard with my heel to stay on, which resulted in a loud tearing noise and a reasonable amount of pain where my hamstring joins my arse.

This took quite a while to sort out, and for several months would be quite painful if I drove for anything over an hour.  What seems to have improved it a lot (although its still not quite perfect) is running followed by stretching.

I would be interested to know people thoughts on how to prevent these types of injury.  I'm not sure about pre-climbing stretching - hasn't there been research to show that pre-exercise stretching may actually weak muscles?  Would a better method of injury prevention be to do some sort of exercices to make the hamstring muscles stronger?  If so, what sort of exercises would people suggest without access to a gym?

[rodma]

I also tore my hammy heelhooking several years back. I had been practising heelhooks a lot and was getting way stronger on them (or so i thought). When I went to see the physio to get it sorted, she had issues even finding my hamstring. My heelhooking prowess was solely down to the fact that when i lifted my knee upwards towards my chest, my leg automatically bent because my hamstrings were so damn tight. Now that I am marginally more flexible I am pretty shit on a heel, but that's mostly because I haven't done anything to strengthen my hammys

[saltbeef]

she had issues even finding my hamstring.

hahaha!