Take 10 Minutes/Day To Bulletproof Your Ankles…You’ll Be Happy You Did!
If You Don’t Pre-Hab or Rehab Your Ankles Now, You’ll Hate Yourself Later
I sought out to do a 4-week case study – on myself – to see what the Freo Board could do for the chronic tightness on the inside of my right knee.
This was caused by playing 17 years of an unbalanced one-sided sport, baseball…along with a bad ankle sprain my Freshman year in college, and jamming my right leg into the hip climbing a wall going back on fly ball during a game against Fullerton my Sophomore year.
Also dumb knuckle-headed-ness like running a marathon in 2008, and doing high repetition Cross-fit WOD’s post marathon were straws that FINALLY broke the camel’s back (or in my case my knee).
I had been using a Foam Roll
, Trigger Point
, and stretching strategies in the past, and would feel better that day, but the tightness would return the next day.
And I’m happy to report that after one week of using the Freo Board, I haven’t had to Foam Roll or Trigger Point my TFL or IT Bands, or stretch out my hamstrings and calves in the last 3 weeks!
Some benefits I’ve felt:
- Little to no tension on the inside of my right knee,
- Better stability when changing direction,
- More hamstring flexibility when bending over and picking things up,
- Less calf tightness, and
- Lighter on my feet.
Overall benefits of using a Freo or Slant Board…
- Build better ankle mobility,
- Secure better knee stability,
- Make hip mobility better,
- Overall better balance,
- Great pre-rehabilitation for ankle, knee, and hip, and
- Superb ankle, knee, or hip rehabilitation post injury.
Benefits for hitters…
- Better dynamic balance on off-speed and breaking balls,
- Will move better, therefore will perform better,
- Boost in running speed and agility, and
- More effective in dealing with and transferring Gravitational Forces.
Training Protocol
- At least 4-5 days per week,
- 5-10 minutes per day,
- Do the “cross” foot positions on Days-1-3-5, and
- Do the “X” foot positions on Days-2-4
- Progressions: move the non-balancing leg in front, to the side, and behind the athlete
Resources mentioned in the above video
- Yoga Mat
, - Slant Board,
- Freo Board (what I’m using in the video), and
- GymBoss – Interval timer which I suggest setting at 20-secs work time, and 5-secs foot position switch time.
,
,
– Interval timer which I suggest setting at 20-secs work time, and 5-secs foot position switch time.Look, whether you’re trying to reduce your risk for injury, currently rehabbing a recent injury, or the injury was a decade ago, the Freo Board will help…A LOT.
Please keep me updated on the progress of your hitters by using the Freo or Slant Board by sharing your thoughts in the comments section below…
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Excellent Joey! All I would add if I may would be that adding a little wrist extension when balancing… it would be difficult to explain but if position correctly than connection and energy flow or resistance with some jaw action should unwind you but I’ll not go there since that is extremely complicated… nice article once again…
Funny thing i bet many people will just not see the bigger picture… later..
~DM
Joey…as someone who fixed his posture and was new and ignorant too and the benefits of posture…I would add some hand/finger positioning and messaging with some proper breathing… I would do all the fingers but especially the index and thumb…. you can even use a golf ball… it is extremely difficult to explain but it’s not just the pressure but the ability to reposition your alignment of the hand/fingers… I hope you find this interesting… later…
~DM