Don't stretch this, please. It can and probably will, make things worse. The hamstrings are probably just a symptom, a guarding reflex to protect the knee, but can be the actual cause of the exact pain you feel. More on that later. Realize at this point that tests so far indicate what I would have told you, that a pain in the knee very often has little to do with the knee itself, so will show nothing on scans.

One typical differential diagnosis that comes up when searching for "pain behind knee" is a Baker's Cyst, but I would nor expect something like that in a tenderfoot runner with a year under his/her belt. Often undiscussed are the many muscles acting on the knee that produce pain symptoms in that location, but first, I want to ask you why you did back-to-back long runs at the same time you were adding speed to your routine. The question is rhetorical; I already know why. I did it myself in the first year of running, and had the pains to show for it. The rule of thumb here is, you can gradually increase your time, mileage, or intensity, but not more than one of these factors at a time. Your training will always be ahead of your body's ability to adapt to the new stress, and this is one reason why we train at all. Just add patience and strategy to the mix. Don't pile it on all at once, or overuse injury is the result. Chalk it up to experience.

Back to those muscles, they have a lot to do with stability when running. Though you have been using them in the pool for years, they are being used in a different way now, and will need time to adjust to the new work load and firing order. It's a neuromuscular re-education process that underscores the fact that fitness at one sport does not necessarily translate directly to another, without approaching the new sport as a complete newbie. However, you have still worked the muscle in both sports, and have to account for that when calculating your training load. I know the impatience. It's pretty hard to resist the adrenaline rush of more miles and more speed, but lesson learned and we'll move on.

The outer hamstring Biceps Femoris is the major knee flexor and hip extender, and will be pressed into service more as you add speed. Check out the BFs on a sprinter for details. The main symptom of BF tightness is dull aching pain in the lateral rear knee. Some have success foam-rolling out knots in this muscle to alleviate this pain, but I must caution you to do it properly and not excessively. this is not like icing, which numbs pain and little else when there is no swelling. This, like other self-massage techniques, can promote healing rather than simply cover up pain like ice and meds. Just make sure to limit the time spent on the technique to a few applications of limited duration each day, and let your body do the rest of the healing in your off-time. Some activity to encourage circulation without excessive loading of the muscle (such as the load during a stretch is often overdone) can help speed healing. Foam rolling or massage on extremities should be done in the direction of the valves in your veins and lymphatic vessels, which is toward the heart. This not only makes physiological sense, it will help prevent potential damage to these valves, such as varicosities.

Your other hamstrings can contribute to this pain, so the therapy chosen should fan out across the entire rear thigh. Meanwhile, there are a few more muscles to consider. The large calf muscles Soleus and Gastoc can contribute to rear-knee pain, and would be taxed by speed and mileage as well. Apply some therapy there. Two small muscles found in the actual rear-knee compartment should not be overlooked - the knee-unlocker Popliteus and plantarflexor Plantaris, which though tiny and so vestigial as to be sometimes mistaken for a nerve in cadavers, still feels pain like everything else. How many hairs do I have to pull to produce pain? Plantaris is more substantial than a hair. These back-of-knee muscles are in a sensitive area, and should be approached carefully near unprotected arteries and nerves (arteries throb, nerves register numbness and "electrical" pain).

Use the following tool as an aid to locating muscles and what they do...

http://www.getbodysmart.com/ap/muscularsystem/legmuscles/plantaris/tutorial.html

Please understand that though self-applied therapies seem simple in nature, they address the elaborate complexity of muscle structure and function. It only takes a handfull of spasms in microscopic motor untis to produce a boatload of pain and bring an entire muscle to its, um, knees, and it helps to think of it as pulling that tiny hair again. You may have to hunt for the spots to fix, or enlist professional help, but these tiny mini-spasms are the only damage you need to limit your mileage and increase your pain. Handling them properly will turn things the other way around.

Thank you so much for the post.

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