Ankle mobility
Ideally, you will be able to touch the wall with your knee. You might measure your assessment, add some ankle mobility stretches and reassess before your next workout. Keeping the right foot at this position, try to touch the wall in front of you with your left knee without lifting your heel. Place your right foot 5-6 inches away from the wall. It’s a very good idea to try to incorporate some of ankle mobility exercises to the classes, maybe as a warm up or an easy drill? One of the simple assessments is the one I mentioned here.
![ankle mobility ankle mobility](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/n5_jcUY7geI/maxresdefault.jpg)
Try some yoga balance asanas, or just stand on one leg while washing dishes or brushing your teeth. It’s equally important while running, jumping or kicking. Whichever movement we do, we need to make sure our feet are stable. We have 28 bones in our feet and 30 joints and more than 100 muscles, tendons, and ligaments in each foot (see here ). We all know knee problems are one of the most common amongst Martial Artists, so you might want to try to be proactive!
![ankle mobility ankle mobility](https://static.wixstatic.com/media/06d673_22b0fa79a0fa41b198c5657c2f5b8b9c~mv2.jpeg)
Your ankles need mobility, you should work on that for a couple of minutes every time you train.Īccording to a joint by joint approach, if we don’t have mobility in our ankles, the next joint – the knee – a joint that is supposed to be stable, will try to do both – and add mobility to compensate for ankles lack thereof.
#Ankle mobility how to#
(Here you can read a little about common foot problems and how to chose the right shoesĪdding some ankle stretches to the usual stretching routine might benefit us all. I’m not even talking about high heels here. There are shoes – even the pricey ones – that are hurting us.
![ankle mobility ankle mobility](https://fitnessmik.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/fix-your-squat-lack-of-ankle-mobility-l-Db8-aJpRMsddefault.jpg)
People think shoes are this great invention that is designed to help us. Luckily for us Martial Artists, we mostly work out barefoot. In fact if you strengthen your ankle it will help you walk better (correctly) and will help to stop or slow down the weakening of your knee and hip muscles. Ankles in fact need mobility and restricting that doesn’t do us any good. People think we need to restrict our ankle movement in order to perform better – check out all the basketball sneakers out there. (see my article about knee problems here) Next available joints, the knees often take over trying to help the ankles. Many injuries are connected to lack of thereof. Importance of MobilityĪnkle mobility is more important than most of us think. Trust me, Crocs and flip flops are not doing them any good! But this is the topic for another article. Another delicate issue is the choice of footwear parents provide for their kids. Don’t wait until your child is in need of an orthopedic insoles. There are so many ways we as parents can help out. Wanting to help is one thing, but how to bring it up to the parents? As a parent I would be offended and/or angry. We often see how bad some of those little feet are at such early ages! I always feel conflicted, because I notice fallen arches or the way the walking visibly affects the knees and the whole posture. I think we, as instructors, are on a mission here. If the kids stick with a bad form, injuries might happen. Performing all the exercises, especially the kicks with a proper form is extremely important. Observing their movement, lack of flexibility, and lack of mobility is not good.
![ankle mobility ankle mobility](https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/ypEAAOSwH3liX8fp/s-l500.jpg)
As instructors, we are working with kids a lot.