Hamstring Injury

I visited the physio last week and she diagnosed me with a mild hamstring strain.  She did some ultra sound and a massage and then applied some sports tape to the back of my leg and told me to wear the tape for 4 days and to not run for one week.  I am going back to see her on Thursday.

My leg was definately feeling better and I felt I wanted to run, (I didn't)! I took the tape off yesterday but all day today I have felt a dull ache at the back of my knee and back of the leg.  Is this normal? does the tape really work?.

Can anyone please give me some advise, I have a half marathon this Sunday and then London Marathon in April.  How long does a mild hamstring take?  Should I run the half on Sunday or give myself a bit longer to recover?  I feel so annoyed with myself but don't want to do any further damage in case I run the risk of not being able to take part in the Marathon.

This is the first time I have ever had an injury from running!

Thanks.

Hamstrings are notorious for re-occurring but what you have is quite mild. I mean, you haven't snapped it.

The dull ache you feel is associated with the repair mechanism of muscle fibres.

I imagine myself that the ache (not sharp pain) is the new fibres complaining about having to do some work. They'll get used to it.

Normally takes around 10 days to gradually get things in order.

Need to avoid too much too soon though.

Thanks very much.  It turns out that I have a grade 2 tear, visited the physio again today and received further ultra sound and massage.  She has advised not to run for another week.  Starting to really panic now as there is just over 7 weeks to the Marathon.  Is it possible I can come back from this ok and start running long distances again?  This is so new to me I have never had an injury before, just not sure how to handle it.  Advice please?

Thank you.

Patience is required in these circumstances. Which is difficult with a deadline looming.

I would say you've had it as far as a marathon is concerned. The injury is still present. Then there's the period of rehabilitation, then conditioning before you get back to trying to be fitter.

This can take weeks or months.

But you will be told by others with questionable motives that you can just go ahead and tough it out. 

Some runners can never get their heads around the time scales involved with injuries.

Some runners I've known have never worked out how to deal with an injury. 

For them, the first significant injury they got was the end of them as runners.