Hormonal and anatomical differences make women more prone to hip injuries than men.

Gender has a great influence in running, being the women the most injured.

¨With women, we typically see more hip injuries and a little bit more with the knee,¨ said Tyler Hollenbeck, the athletic trainer for the Memphis Tigers assigned to cross country and track and field.

Tyler Hollenbeck

Especially in distance runners, stress fractures are common throughout the knee, the hip, and the upper part of the leg. However, in sprinters run with more quick, explosive activities, so their injuries will be more muscular although in the same areas of the body.

In an Instagram survey about injuries of distance women runners, sprinters and jumpers between 17-20 years, 61 percent said they had been injured at least once while running. Among the injuries were knee tendinitis or torn cartilage.

In contrast, men tend to injure themselves more in the ankle, foot, and lower leg, Hollenbeck said.

¨That's not to say they don't have any hip injuries, just a little less likely, and especially in running,¨ he said. ¨Also, you'll still see stress fractures from time to time, and if they have them, they will probably be in the ankle and the foot.¨

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Anatomical differences in the Q angles between the hip and the knee cause these differences in men and women. ¨Women have a bigger angle than men, so they distribute the force differently,¨ Hollenbeck explained.

Additionally, women have a different bone density and a different body fat composition. Taken together, all of those factors causes the male and female body to handles stress, especially with activities like running, differently.

Hormonal changes also play a part. One of the phenomena in female athletes is called the female athlete triad. "It's a combination of a lot of training and maybe some eating disorders where you don't get all the necessary nutrients," said Hollenbeck. Abnormal menstrual cycles and osteoporosis (loss of bone density) also can contribute to women suffering stress injuries, especially when running.

Emily Treptow, a long-distance runner, is one of the six runners at the University of Memphis track team who has been injured this season. She currently suffers from a stress reaction in her femur.

"Before that, I had a stress fracture in the same bone, so I am afraid of injuring myself again once healed and not being able to run anymore," she said.