How Pelvic Position Changes Your Hamstring Risk (By 31%)

What's good people!

Welcome to today's Speed Brief, where we dive into the essentials of athletic performance, helping you run faster, train smarter, and stay injury-free.

"Just do more Nordic curls" - that's been the go-to advice for hamstring injury prevention forever. But here's the thing - while we've spent years focusing purely on strengthening, new research shows we might be missing half the picture. Today, we're diving into how sprint mechanics could be the key to keeping your hamstrings healthy.

Think about this: Over 47% of hamstring injuries happen during sprinting. Yet most prevention programs focus almost exclusively on building eccentric strength. Don't get me wrong - strength matters. But when your hamstrings are handling forces up to 10 times your body weight during sprinting, how you move becomes just as crucial as how strong you are.

I've seen this many times with athletes - great Nordic curl strength, but their sprint mechanics are setting them up for trouble. Here's what's really going on during high-speed running.

Key Mechanical Factors

Lumbo-Pelvic Control

Your pelvis is like the steering wheel of your sprint. When it's not controlled properly, everything else goes off track. I see this all the time - athletes with seemingly strong hamstrings but poor pelvic control. Here's what happens: according to experts, poor control can increase strain on your hamstrings by up to 25mm. That might not sound like much, but at high speeds, it's a game-changer.

I started filming my athletes from the side during max velocity sprints. You'd be pretty amazed how many show excessive pelvic movement without realizing it. The key is watching how the pelvis moves not just during ground contact, but through the entire sprint cycle. Slow-mo recording is your friend here.

Anterior Pelvic Tilt

Here's something wild - the study shows that increased anterior pelvic tilt can boost tension on your biceps femoris (the hamstring muscle that gets injured most often) by over 31%. No amount of strength training can make up for positioning that puts you at that kind of disadvantage.

Forward Trunk Lean

This one's important, especially as athletes fatigue. Excessive forward lean doesn't just look bad - it fundamentally changes how your hamstrings have to work. When you're leaning too far forward, you're asking your hamstrings to handle forces they were never designed to deal with.

So what should you do?

Making It Work in Training

Here's what's working well with my athletes:

Rather than just jumping into sprint work, we spend the first 10 minutes of every session on what I call "position priming." It's not just a warm-up - it's teaching your body where it needs to be when the intensity ramps up.

During speed sessions, we're breaking things down differently now. Instead of just focusing on distances and times, we're looking at mechanical checkpoints. How's the pelvic position during acceleration? How's trunk control during max velocity? These aren't just technical points - they're injury prevention in action.

Between sets, we're doing quick resets. Just 2-3 quick drills to remind the body of proper positioning. This has been so good for maintaining mechanics when fatigue starts to creep in.

And the athletes aren't just staying healthier - they're getting faster. Turns out, good mechanics and injury prevention go hand in hand with performance. Who knew?

Remember, this isn't about completely changing your training. It's about adding the right elements in the right places. Start with filming your sprints - you might be surprised by what you see.

That's it for today's Speed Brief!

Got questions about your sprint mechanics? Hit reply - I'd love to help you optimise your technique for both speed and safety.

Have a great weekend.

Liam

TSP

www.thespeedproject.com