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Eccentric hamstring torque production and muscle activity in unassisted versus assisted Nordic Hamstring Exercises

Review written by Adam Johnson info

Key Points

  1. Through a longer time under tension and greater range of movement, assisted Nordic Hamstring Exercise variations produced greater torque than the conventional NHE.
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BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVE

Hamstring injuries continue to pose a major problem within elite sporting environments such as football (1). One of the main modifiable risk factors that has been identified within the literature is eccentric hamstring torque (2). The Nordic Hamstring Exercise (NHE) has been proposed as a strategy to address this major modifiable risk factor but has been poorly adopted within elite footballing settings due to complaints such as muscle soreness felt by athletes after completion of the exercise (3).

Another barrier to compliance is the fact that the exercise does not fully replicate the mechanics commonly associated with hamstring injury which are eccentric knee flexion in a hip flexed position, or the late swing phase of gait as it is termed. The NHE exercise is traditionally performed as a bilateral bodyweight exercise whereby the subject resists the falling motion through an eccentric contraction of their hamstrings, but it can also be performed with assistance of either a band (4) or an ergometer as is the case within this paper.

The objective of this paper was to compare the eccentric torque production and muscle activity when also performing this exercise as an assisted bilateral and unilateral exercise, with hip and knee joint angles closer replicating the position of vulnerability to hamstring injury.

Hamstring injuries continue to pose a major problem within elite sporting environments such as football.
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This study suggests that the assisted variations of the Nordic Hamstring Exercise provide much greater eccentric mechanical load through higher eccentric torque production than the conventional Nordic Hamstring Exercise.

METHODS

  • This study utilized a cohort of 12 recreational athletes (three women, nine men).
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