Hamstring injuries are one of the most common sports injuries affecting athletes. The NordBoard Hamstring Testing System is meant to help prevent those injuries by measuring the hamstring strength of individual athletes, thus allowing their coaches and trainers to adapt their training accordingly and prevent injuries in the future.
Developed by Vald Performance of Australia after five years of development and testing on over 1,000 athletes, the NordBoard is based on one of the more popular hamstring exercises called the Nordic curl. Athletes kneel on the Nordboard and bend forward from the knee as far as possible while stirrups hold their legs in place just above the ankles.
The NordBoard can then test for eccentric strength (when a muscle returns from a shortened or contracted position to a resting one) and isometric strength (when joint angle and muscle length do not change during contraction) during the exercise. Any variations in either of these can be used to indicate the potential for injury or the possibility of further injury for athletes that may be recovering from a hamstring pull, tear or strain.
Vald states that athletes who are weak in this exercise are found to be more likely to face a hamstring injury in the future. It adds that proper use of the Nordboard will help decrease the financial cost of those injuries to athletes and professional teams, by facilitating proper hamstring strengthening and conditioning.
The company has been or will be sending the Nordboard system for use by European soccer teams, universities, the National Football League (NFL), the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), and Major League Baseball (MLB) teams. No details were available as to how much the system costs.
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