The Hamstring Challenge: Rethinking How We Approach Hamstring Injury
Focus on how the athlete is moving. Not just what they’re doing, but how they’re doing it.
On any given day, LinkedIn is full of well-crafted, colourful, “Bompa-esk” return-to-play hamstring protocols — loaded with strength blocks, detailed progressions, and some excellent thinking.
Let’s make one thing clear: there is great work being done in the rehab space. Strength work matters. Progression matters. Detail matters.
But too often, something vital is missing.
We see glute circuits, hamstring eccentrics, Nordics, isometrics, strength diagnostics, force plate results — yet barely a word on how the athlete is moving. Not just what they’re doing, but how they’re doing it.
Pelvic Control Is the Missing Link
I want to call this out directly.
When it comes to hamstring injuries, one of the most overlooked factors in rehab is frontal plane control of the pelvis — or, more simply, hip lock. Sure its discussed, but is anyone really looking at it?
The work of Dr. Johan Lahti and Dr. Jurdan Mendiguchia (among others) has been clear: the control of the pelvis in the frontal plane is a key component of hamstring function and injury prevention. The biceps femoris, a common injury site, sits lateral to the femur and is exposed in the presence of excessive frontal plane Abduction (ipsilateral side dropping in stance phase). When we lose lateral pelvic control — whether through inhibition, poor coordination, or residual dysfunction — we increase the risk of re-injury.
The problem? Almost no one is building this into their rehab process in a meaningful, trackable way.
Train Movement, Not Just Muscle
I had this exact conversation yesterday: “We just need more glute to improve injury resilience.” No, we don’t. The athlete’s strength data is off the chart! We need the athlete to learn to run fast. We need better motor control.
Too many rehab models stop at strength and capacity. That’s the base — the early part of the continuum. But what comes next? What governs how that strength is expressed under high-speed, sport-specific load?
If you’re not training and measuring how the pelvis behaves in the frontal plane during sprinting, you’re not closing the loop. And that’s where SpeedSig comes in.
Two Coaches and a Coffee Podcast by Jason Weber and Darren Burgess
WE’RE ALWAYS EXPLORING HAMSTRING INJURIES IN OUR PODCAST, LISTEN TO SOME EPISODE HERE
What SpeedSig Shows — and Why It Matters
We built SpeedSig because no tool existed to quantify this critical part of movement. Yes, I’m biased. But I’m also speaking from experience — 20 years of asking questions that weren’t being answered by the tools available at the time.
What we now know — categorically — is that hip lock is often the first thing to fail after a hamstring injury. And yet it’s rarely assessed, rarely trained explicitly, and almost never tracked over time.
In Paralympic sport, this becomes even more obvious. Athletes with compromised limbs will vault through asymmetrical gaits, producing speed in ways that aren’t biomechanically sustainable. It works — until it doesn’t. And the same applies to able-bodied field sport athletes: you might hit target speed numbers, but how you're achieving them is the real question.
Speed alone is not enough.
Speed as a Proxy Is Broken
Let’s be honest: in most return-to-play models, if an athlete hits 90-95% of their top speed, the rehab is considered successful.
But what if they’re achieving that speed differently than they were pre-injury? What if that difference is subtle but significant? What if it’s putting them at risk? What if they can’t sustain the mechanics to achieve that speed.
Ive seen it time and again — athletes “pass” the speed test and re-enter competition, only to break down weeks later.
Field sport athletes can muscle through dysfunction. Especially when top speeds are in the 9.0–9.5 m/s range — you can get there inefficiently and still tick the box. But what happens under repeated effort? What happens when fatigue hits? That’s where asymmetries emerge and risk climbs.
Challenge to Practitioners: Ask Better Questions
This isn’t a knock on current methods — it’s a challenge to go further.
Force plates, GPS, strength diagnostics — all critical tools. But they’re not the whole picture. If we’re serious about reducing reinjury, about truly understanding movement quality, then we need to ask:
How are athletes achieving the outputs we measure?
What compensations are hiding behind clean numbers?
What don’t we know — and what tools are helping us find out?
SpeedSig isn’t about throwing out what you’re already doing. It’s about layering on new insight. It gives you visibility into movement quality in ways traditional tools can’t. And that changes everything — not just for performance, but for long-term athlete health.
Progress Is Earned
I’ve been in this game a long time. I was part of one of the first teams in the world with full GPS in 2004. And here’s the truth: GPS hasn’t changed in 20 years. A few new metrics, sure — but fundamentally, it’s the same tool.
SpeedSig is different. It doesn’t just measure where an athlete is going or how fast they get there — it measures how they move while doing it. It’s been validated. It’s reliable. And it’s giving practitioners answers they couldn’t access before.
So here’s the challenge:
Start thinking differently about injury. Ask the harder questions. Look deeper into how your athletes are moving.
Because getting them back is only part of the job — keeping them back is where it counts.
Lesson 1: Responsibility Means You’ll Upset People
Powell famously said,
“Good leadership involves responsibility to the welfare of the group, which means some people will get angry at your actions and decisions.”
This truth hits home in sports leadership, especially post-COVID, where financial constraints and resource scarcity are common. Often, leaders hire staff who either align too closely with their views or are easy to manage…people who won’t challenge the status quo. But avoiding challenges or dissent stifles growth and problem-solving.
Strong leadership requires building an environment where diverse opinions are encouraged. A leader’s job isn’t to make everyone happy but to make tough decisions that drive the team forward.
When your decisions upset people, it’s often a sign you’re holding firm to your principles and the team’s best interests.
Assess How They Move, Not Just How Fast They Get There. — Jason Weber
