How do triathletes and tennis players work on the ankle flexibility?
Former Member
While I keep working on increasing my ankle flexibility, I recently read in an article that ankle flexibility comes at the cost of ankle instability (= higher propensity for ankle sprain), which spells trouble for runners and tennis players.
Tennis being my other favorite sport, this puts me in a dilemma.
Are there master swimmers out there who also maintain competitiveness in tennis or running, or is this a "you can't have a cake and eat it too" situation?
I am hoping that I can become competitive in swimming with ankles that are stable (read rigid in swimming) enough for tennis as well.
As for stability, in my youth, I broke my legs 7 times... mostly around the ankles/feet. I don't think ankle flexibility in itself brings on sprains. I think once you get the first sprain/strain/break, unless you restrengthen properly you're at risk for more and more sprains. Here are the exercises I did in high school (and I go through a month or so more of these each time I sprain my ankle):
Toe raises: each leg, toe pointed neutral/in/out, 10-20 each direction, go really slow when coming down
Ankle pulls: loop of theraband over both feet. with one leg at a time, pull/flex your ankle outwards. 10-20 each leg
Leg lifts: Balanced flat on one foot, lift the other leg forward, out, and back (returning leg to the center each time). 10-20 full circuits each leg.
If your nerve pathways are as thrashed as mine were, you might have to hold onto something to do the leg lifts. Then do them without holding on. Then do them with your eyes shut. The purpose of this exercise is twofold: to strengthen the little bitty stabilizer muscles and to rebuild the nerve pathways that say, "Hey brain, you're about to go over on your ankle. How about we compensate for that!"
Since doing these exercises, I went from about 3-4 bad sprains/year (like bad enough to require crutches) to about 1 every 4 years or so. And during that time, my ankle flexibility has improved a lot. While I don't run or play tennis, I used to play soccer and had no problems with flexible swimming ankles and playing soccer (though I taped up before games and practice.)
As for stability, in my youth, I broke my legs 7 times... mostly around the ankles/feet. I don't think ankle flexibility in itself brings on sprains. I think once you get the first sprain/strain/break, unless you restrengthen properly you're at risk for more and more sprains. Here are the exercises I did in high school (and I go through a month or so more of these each time I sprain my ankle):
Toe raises: each leg, toe pointed neutral/in/out, 10-20 each direction, go really slow when coming down
Ankle pulls: loop of theraband over both feet. with one leg at a time, pull/flex your ankle outwards. 10-20 each leg
Leg lifts: Balanced flat on one foot, lift the other leg forward, out, and back (returning leg to the center each time). 10-20 full circuits each leg.
If your nerve pathways are as thrashed as mine were, you might have to hold onto something to do the leg lifts. Then do them without holding on. Then do them with your eyes shut. The purpose of this exercise is twofold: to strengthen the little bitty stabilizer muscles and to rebuild the nerve pathways that say, "Hey brain, you're about to go over on your ankle. How about we compensate for that!"
Since doing these exercises, I went from about 3-4 bad sprains/year (like bad enough to require crutches) to about 1 every 4 years or so. And during that time, my ankle flexibility has improved a lot. While I don't run or play tennis, I used to play soccer and had no problems with flexible swimming ankles and playing soccer (though I taped up before games and practice.)
