A quick Google search defines sprint as a “run at full speed over a short distance.” Sprinting becomes more sport-specific and the all-knowing Google calls it “the competitive athletic sport of running distances of 400 metres or less.”
Regardless of how we define it is done in sport, in play and in life to varying degrees depending on the situation and those involved. Be it sprinting to catch a bus, a ball, a rival player or in the not so distant past, that last package of toilet paper, it is a skill that lends itself to success and glory! It is one of those ingrained movement patterns that can often decide if we made it or we did not. Sometimes when we need to get somewhere, we just need to do it fast.
However, an unfortunate fact that is widely known is that the hamstring muscles are susceptible to an acute strain during sprinting (Chumanov et al, 2012). Nothing can derail that glorious rush across the finish line or that sometimes necessary b-line to the washroom like a pulled hammy! Read on for salvation from such a terrible and untimely fate.