Ankle Injuries are a common sports injury and especially for runners. Despite ankle injuries being super common, it is often overlooked and treated wrongly. Ankle is a crucial part of runners, essentially the first joint to take the load throughout a run. Considering how much stress and load it takes, it’s no surprise how overuse and exercise can result in injury and pain.
Now injuries are a pain and is every runner’s worst nightmare, and though at times despite the precaution taken luck at times may be against you. Ankle Injuries as mentioned are at times a result of overtraining and poor running form accompanied with even poorer bio mechanics.
Let’s look into one of the most common forms of ankle injuries, a sprain. A sprain usually takes place when the ankle is forced to move out of its normal position or range of motion that it is used to, which can cause one or multiple ligaments to overstretch, or result in a partial or full tear. This is caused by awkward falls, improper landing and from contact.
Here are a few tips to prevent ankle injuries:
Warm up
Always start your exercise/and run with a light warm up, to get your blood going. Think of you warming up your car in the morning, before you drive it. One of the easiest forms of warming includes a light jog for about two to three minutes. The goal is to get your body warmed up, and to not make the common mistake of force stretching.
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Muscle Conditioning
If you are an avid runner or athlete, progressively loading your leg muscles should be done in steady increments to ensure that muscle fatigue doesn’t kick in. One often underlooked muscle group is also the calf muscles. Training them will aid in ankle control and strength.
Wear the right footwear
Wearing the appropriate footwear also aids in injury prevention. Though at times some good running shoes may come at a hefty price, investing in a good pair will help you in the long run. As these top end running shoes, come with the right cushioning which helps with load absorption. Look and evaluate for a running shoe that is within your budget, and did we mention the extra motivation that you get as well.
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Uneven Surfaces
Another thing to be wary of is the surface that you will be running on, try and set up routes that have even surfaces. Uneven surfaces will tend to be more stressful on your ankle, and result in ankle rolling which in turn will cause overstretching and puts your ankle in awkward positions that result in injury.
Each ankle injury has different grades and severity of the injury itself. Depending on your injury, the appropriate time must be given for it to recover and rehab. The best signs to know if you can get back to running are if there is no pain, swelling and if you can hop in all directions. In the event you are unable too, more time will be needed to rest. In the event that you can not put weight on the injury, seek medical advice immediately and start your treatment.
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