I hurt my leg doing squats

[gutsandblood]

I am 41 and have been lifting steady for 3 months. I was a very consistent lifter 88 thru 94. and squats were my favorite exercise. I remember it was not much for me back then to get 12 reps with 405.

I have a small home gym setup, with a power rack, dumbbells, pull downs, everything I need to hit the basics. A co-worker of mine ( 18 year old guy) wanted to start lifting with me. For 12 weeks everything has been going great for both of us. He is progressing every single week. and me, well muscle memory is great

The training style we do is like Dorian Yates or DC style, my version of it anyway. Get a pump and do one set to beat the log book. Were looking to get bigger muscles as opposed to stronger. I hope it is okay me posting this here in the strongman forum. training is as following

Day 1: arms then legs
Day 2: off
Day 3: back, chest, delts
Day 4: off
day 5: repeat

Everything was great until two days ago. I was going for 190X8 on squats. at rep4 I hurt something on my mid inner quad. As a matter of fact it is so mid inner I am not sure it is not a hamstring muscle. It scared me more then anything, and screamed like a woman

Just a little history about me doing squats in the past. I always warmed up with leg extensions, and ham curls, but I don't have either one of those in my gym, so I was just doing more warm-ups with squats, but never got a good pump like delts and such. And I only went to parallel in the past, not to the basement. But I wanted to teach the 18 year old what I thought to be the right way, which is going all the way down. I really enjoy being a mentor for him, because he does everything I say to do. If I say get 8 reps he does 12.

Unfortunately going to the doctor is not an option. At day 3 it is just a little sore.

My question is I am not sure how to handle the future. And I am sure I will be gun-shy in the future squat-wise. Also when I bench press ( I am at 190x8 today) my insticts are saying this is to heavy. Could you guys give me any advice?

 

[walker11]

stretch more. i used to pull/strain my adductors at every meet i would squat in untill i started taking stretching seriously. it sounds like you just just pulled a muscle when you were squating, so stretching will help with both rehab and prevention.

 

[gutsandblood]

thanks for the reply walker11. Its good to know it is somewhat common, and that stretching will help.

 

[5004paloma]

Agreed. Warm up is key. Rollers and soft tissue work on off days help with recovery too. Ever notice how sets 3&4 are easier than 1&2? Many times I fail to fully get the glutes and hams activated fully - usually by not doing enough warm-up sets.

Good luck.

 

[mdras]

I agree-very important to stretch and warm up sufficiently. Hope it's nothing serious.

 

[tenny]

well, did it hurt???

is it discolored????

bruised????

swollin???

did it make a noise or sound when it happend??


give me more details man

 

[Racepicks]

I did the same thing a few weeks ago. I swear it was more an abducter muscle rather than a hamstring. I also recently started lifting again about 6 months ago after a 20 year break. Things were progressing fine. I worked up to 315 for 3 reps. The guy I work out with, a competitive powerlifter, told me I would never build up to really big weights if I used the close stance I was using. Next squat day I widened my stance and while warming up with 185, I felt a pop in my inner thigh. Thing was sore for weeks, couldn't do anything for legs except leg extensions. Now I'm not sure I want to go back to wide stance. It feels OK now after 3 weeks. My training partner said to stretch out more and keep the wide stance, using light weights and higher reps until I strengthen the area. Sound like good advice?

 

[lightofmyboner]

Agreed. Warm up is key. Rollers and soft tissue work on off days help with recovery too. Ever notice how sets 3&4 are easier than 1&2? Many times I fail to fully get the glutes and hams activated fully - usually by not doing enough warm-up sets.

I'm that way for every exercise. It takes a while to get the nerves firing, and I'll often feel I'm at failure on a weight while warming up and, after that set, bump up the weight by 20% or so and think it feels easy.