Hamstring Training - 3 of 3

Exercise of the Week: The Hamstring Curl and Variations

After the previous 3 articles being on hip extension exercises, I thought I would provide some tips on the hip flexor exercise – the hamstring curl.

How often do you climb on the hamstring curl machine and wail away until your hamstrings are crying without having thought about anything else except being able to walk afterwards. Quite often I see men and women doing hamstring curls up to 20 reps, with no tempo and no thought or care about foot position. I can guarantee you one thing, there is more to the hamstrings than just making them burn.

The hamstrings have 2 functions: knee flexion and hip extension. The hamstrings are the muscle on the back of your leg that originate in the hip and attach just below the knee. There are actually THREE parts to the hamstring: the semimembranosous (S.M.), semitendinosous (S.T.), and the biceps femoris (B.F.). The S.M. and S.T. make up the medial portion of the hamstring and the B.F. makes up the lateral portion.

This paragraph is for all you folk who like to hammer off 15-20 reps on the hammy machine to ‘feel the burn'; the hamstrings are a FAST TWITCH muscle. This means that they are designed to lift heavy weight and fatigue quickly. For complete beginners I never prescribe any more than 10 reps on the hamstring curl, and for novice and experienced lifters the most reps I prescribe are 8. For anyone who has been lifting for any period of time, no more than 8 reps should be done; if you can do 8 reps easily JACK THE WEIGHT UP. For the best results the concentric contraction should be 1 second max, and you can play around with the eccentric contraction, that is, I would recommend a minimum of 3 seconds, however, you can increase it up to 4, 5, upwards of 10 second eccentrics.

Another variable that most do not take into consideration is foot positioning. I'll put money on this: watch someone who seems like a novice lifter and does not seem to pay attention to foot position during their hamstring curls. I'll bet that when that person begins to fatigue their feet start to turn outwards and they flex their feet up towards their shins (dorsi flex, this action involves the gastroc and makes the lift easier). This is because the S.M. and the S.T. are typically weaker than the B.F.. The way to go about correcting this imbalance is to vary your foot position. I recommend beginning with your toes turned inwards and pointed (plantar flexed), as this position will specifically target the medial hamstrings (semimembranosous and semitendinosous). After 3-4 weeks of toes in and plantar flexed I would recommend trying a toes neutral position combined with toes in (toes neutral targets all 3 hamstrings) with plantar flexion. The important part is to vary your foot positioning within your programs.

Hopefully these tips help you develop your hamstring better. Varying your foot position and developing all aspects of the hamstring is the #1 way to create stability around the knee and prevent injury!

Jordan Symonds , BA, NSCA-CPT