Pancake Stretch Pain

[lewkowicz613]

Hello,

I just began flexibility and strength training and I began stretching after my warmup and after my exerciseing with some pancake stretches. However after I finished stretching the whole next week my legs were incredibly sore in my hamstring and groin region. The underside of my legs, slightly above the knee, on the outer sides of the leg (both left and right) were painful every time I did anything more than sit. Its been over a month of little to no activity and I still have the pain. Any suggestions? Did I simply overdo it and I need to recouperate longer?

Thanks a lot,

Mark

[Joshua Naterman]

Hard to say, we don't know how hard you stretched or what your stretching history is.

Usually light, slow strength work is what helps this stuff heal. If you stretched too hard, it may take 6-8 weeks for everything to heal up completely. Just do range of motion work, not hard stretches, and slow easy strength work for the areas, and after a while you can SLOWLY start getting back into some more moderate stretching.

[lewkowicz613]

Thanks a lot for the reply. I didn't realize that I could take up to 8 weeks to completely heal.

Thanks again for the help,

Mark

[Joshua Naterman]

Thanks a lot for the reply. I didn't realize that I could take up to 8 weeks to completely heal.

Thanks again for the help,

Mark

No problem! Injury is injury, no matter how you do it. Initial healing times for muscle defects don't change It is also good to realize that it takes at least 12 months to fully restore initial tissue quality, so take your time and work steadily... won't help to rush ahead to try to make up for lost time.

[Cole Dano]

You certainly overdid it. Once you get back to normal keep up the flexibility work, but not so aggressive.

[Michel Hendrickson]

Pancake is a pretty high level stretch. Even though I have such good hamstring flexibility that I barely feel them when I do a hamstring stretch like toe touches and stuff, when I do pancake I still feel some tension in my hamstrings. So it's not hard to imagine that going a bit too far out of the comfort zone will give you pain that will stay for a while. For strength training you may be able to go balls to the wall every now and then, but stretching should be done with more care.