3 reasons your hamstrings are tight + how to properly stretch them
One of the requests I’m most often given at the start of a yoga class is: Hamstrings.
There are so many things in our daily life that can make our hamstrings tight:
Prolonged sitting
Long walks (especially in not ideal shoes)
Spending time looking down at phone and computer screens.
When thinking about the mechanics of the hamstrings (or any body part), it can be helpful to consider how it functions in relation to the quadrants of the body: front, back, top and bottom.
When we sit too long the hamstrings can become tight because they are constantly in a somewhat contracted position. (Hint: if you tend to like to pull your feet underneath the chair you’re sitting on, this could be an indication of tight hamstrings).
When you walk, if your hamstrings are tight, they may not fully be able to lengthen as you move causing you to take shorter strides, which doesn't allow the muscle to elongate and travel through the full range of motion.
If you’re wearing shoes with heels the hamstrings and calves will automatically be shorter and contracted based on the angle of the foot.
The hamstrings can also play a role in the positioning of your pelvis.
The quads on the fronts of the thighs are the antagonist muscle to the hamstrings on the back. If the muscles don’t engage equally when we sit or walk to allow the pelvis to return to a fairly neutral position, it can cause the pelvis to be stuck in either anterior tilt, which creates an over-exaggerated curve in the lower back and puts a lot of pressure on the lumbar spine, or posterior tilt which takes the curve out of the low back and can cause over-lengthening and tension through the hip flexors on the front of the body and shortening of the hamstrings at the back of the body.
And what most of my clients find surprising, your hamstrings are also very connected to your neck (and vice versa).
If your head is regularly in what is called “forward head posture” while you’re working on a computer or looking at screens (basically meaning the head is forward of the shoulders and therefore pulling the neck forward), it can impact what’s called the posterior chain, which includes the spinal muscles, pelvic position and, you guessed it, the hamstrings.
So if you find you have chronically tight hamstrings, it may help to take a look at your neck and pelvic position as well as your quad/hamstring activation.
And of course, because everything is connected, things like stress, fear and other emotional states can impact the amount of tension in our muscles.
Here is a 14-Minute practice to dive deeper into the mechanics of your hamstrings and to help stretch and lengthen the backs of your legs so you can feel more at ease from head to toe...
A couple notes to keep in mind:
1. The body is incredibly receptive, so often less is more in terms of helping retrain it back into the ideal alignment.
2. If you're looking to release tightness and find more ease, you can't create that ease from a place of tension or force. (Trust me, I've tried!).
So when moving through the practice go to a place where you feel a stretch AND also where you can still breathe deeply and find some relaxation so that your nervous system knows the position is safe and it begin to release some of the tightness.
