subject: Simple Ankle Strengthening Exercises To Help You Treat And Avoid Injuries [print this page] Taking care of your ankles is important in staying fit and injury-free especially if you are into some sports. However, ankle strengthening exercises are not just for athletes. Even with day-to-day activities, taking care and strengthening your ankles will save you a lot of trouble like ankle sprains.
Keep in mind too that because the ankle joints carry the weight of the body, ankle injuries may heal slowly and can be a big burden even with simple activities like walking. To help yourself, you can do simple and easy exercises that you can even do at home or in the office to help you build strong joints.
Ankle strengthening exercises are also important components not only in preventing injuries but also in your fast recovery from ankle injuries. Rehabilitation exercises that help you recover fast do involve strengthening exercises as well as those that improve your flexibility.
In sports, it is important to focus on building strong ankles to support your legs and your weight. Along with strengthening your leg, also focus on the ankles, as strong body with weak ankles can be a bad combination. If you are also into plyometric exercises, or those that allow you to jump higher and push your power and speed to its optimum level, ankle strengthening exercises are important to help you avoid injuries.
Of course, you can find a lot of strengthening exercises in the gym but you can also find some simple and easy ankle strengthening exercises that you can do at home or at the office.
Heel raises are simple exercises that you can do at home. This is done by standing straight with your legs kept apart at shoulder width. It is important that you have something to hold on to for balance. It could be a chair high enough to avoid you from stooping. Then you start with raising your heels as high as you can, but of course, there should be no pain.
You can also do heel raises by standing with one foot alone, but make sure you exercise both legs for balance. Balancing in one foot can help you in strengthening your leg joints.
Ankle strengthening exercises may also involve the use of resistance band where you can loop it on the ball of one foot and then pulling the band towards you. You can also make use of the resistance band by anchoring it on a steady object and looping the other end at the balls of your feet and slowly turning your feet against the resistance band. With repetition, these exercises can help build strength in your ankles.
Jumping rope is also one simple exercise to build stronger ankles and legs. Hiking is also a good exercise especially if you are increasing the elevation as you go on with the exercise. Even a simple walking on the balls of your feel, or your heels can help in building strong ankles.
Keep in mind that although these exercises are aimed to build you stronger ankles, these can also cause injury if not properly done. Find a good guide to help you perform the exercises correctly. Always warm up and do stretching exercises before attempting any strengthening exercises as well.
