does anyone have any exercises to strengthen them?

thanks in advance

I use Therabands to strengthen my ankles. I do four different motions. I do two sets of 20 of each exercise for each ankle.

1. Sitting on the floor with legs straight out in front. Wrap Theraband under bottom of one foot and hold the ends in your hands. Push down and release slowly.

2. Tie the Theraband to a bar or railing. While sitting on floor in same position, wrap Theraband over top of foot. Using only your foot, pull back and release slowly.

3. Keep the Theraband tied and stand up. Insert foot so that the band is wrapped around the inner side of the foot. Slowly bend foot inward and release slowly.

4. Same as #3 only on outer side of the foot and slowly bend outward and release slowly.

Weird. I posted a reply to this that shows up on Todays Active Topics page but is listed as posted by theodoresdaddy. But when you click on the topic itself, the post is gone. Some sort of glitch? :confused:

Okay as soon as I posted this, the other post appeared!

[ May 14, 2003, 03:31 PM: Message edited by: George_vikingfan ]

A trainer I know told me I was a lost cause for my chronically-spraining ankle (I was in my early 40s at the time) so I wear an Ace bandage (the kind you just slip on, available at drug stores) for just about all exercise. Haven't had any trouble since.

One of the things not to overlook is strengthening the ankles and calf muscles is to not only strengthen them in the open chain (not weight bearing- like theraband) but to work on them in closed chain positions (weightbearing).

I recommend: 1) heel raises on a step, 2)wall squats, 3) heel/toe walking, 4) single leg stance balance exercises- stand on a single leg for up to 20 seconds without wavering.

I can give more of a progression via email, if you are interested: kick469@hotmail.com

I work as a physical therapist and one of my most common diagnoses is ankle fractures, which typically are accompanied by ankle sprains. Chronic swelling and instability creates abnormal awareness from the nerves in the skin and deep receptors within the joint, so the ankle cannot tell where it is in space- you can strengthen the bejesus out of the muscles like mad and still have weak ankles because the receptors are abnormal. You have to retrain the ankle with a progressive weightbearing program. Hope this helps.