About a month ago, I landed a leap wrong and badly sprained my ankle (tore a ligament). I really want to get back into dancing and doing normal things and I know that it takes time for my ankle to heal, so I need to be patient. I was just wondering if you knew of good stretching and strengthening exercises to help me heal quicker, stronger, and better.

Irishdance’s response: So sorry to hear about your injury, those are never fun. I do know of some good stretching and strengthening things you can do for it while it heals though!

Ankle stretching: A common and really good ankle stretch is the standing lunge stretch. This is where you stand in lunge position with the front leg bent and the back leg straight (being careful to also keep your feet straight). This stretch can also be modified to stretch lower on the calf and into the ankle farther by bending both the front and the back leg simultaneously.

If your injury is still really fresh but you want to do a little bit of ankle stretching a lower impact stretch than the previous one would be a sitting ankle stretch. This stretch is where you sit on the ground bending one knee up and placing the ankle of the other foot on the bent thigh. Then holding onto the foot that is resting on your bent knee use your hand to gently pull the foot in towards yourself (a pointed position). Make sure you pull it so that it is straight instead of rolled in or rolled out. The stretch you should feel will be right across the top of the foot and into the upper instep.

Ankle Strengthening: A good ankle strengthening exercise is to stand on both feet and rise up onto the toes (or when your ankle is strong enough and healed enough stand on one foot and rise up). Start with fewer repetitions(like 10 or so) and work your way up to more as your ankle regains it’s strength.

Another really good and lower impact strengthening exercise is a seated pointing exercise. Sitting with your legs out straight point and flex the feet making sure to work slowly through all the muscles of the ankle and the foot. If you need to add more resistance use a theraband(a stretch band that can be purchased at many sports stores or dance supply stores). You place the band under the ball of your foot holding onto the two ends of the band(increase resistance by lessening the length of the band from your hands to feet) and repeat the pointing exercises.


I hope these exercises and strengthening tips help you to move past this injury in a healthy and happy way! Always remember to start slowly with your recovery exercises and work your way up to more reps and resistance. Also remember to always keep a good balance between strength and flexibility and you’ll be back to dancing in no time! Best of luck with your recovery, and thanks for your ask! [:

-Happy Dancing! :D


P.S. I did not “ask” myself this question, I received it from a follower as a submission and therefore had to edit the post to add a response. By editing the post it for some reason removed the name of the original person who submitted the text post.