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Bodyweight Limited Ankle Mobility and the Pistol

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Skylar Rubalcaba

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So I have really been wanting to attend the SFB course. The one thing that has stopped my is my absolutely horrid ankle mobility. I had a lot of ankle sprains when I was younger and grew up in shoes all the time and as a result I have really poor ankle mobility. Worse than the normal person. This has led me to never even being close to doing a pistol. I can do it assisted with a TRX or band and I can do a very poor one wearing Olympic lifting shoes but in only one leg. I really want to attend but also be able to participate and get something out of the pistol section. I have done the standard ankle mobility drills but none of them have ever made a dent no matter how often I do them.

I was hoping there are others that have experienced something similar themselves or worked with someone similar. I am not sure exactly how to progress to be able to get to the point where I can do a legit barefoot pistol. Hopefully there is someone that would be able to be able to provide some advice or dills.

My goal is to attend SFB in June and be able to participate and learn how to do the pistol better.

Any advice is much appreciated in advance.
 
So I have really been wanting to attend the SFB course. The one thing that has stopped my is my absolutely horrid ankle mobility. I had a lot of ankle sprains when I was younger and grew up in shoes all the time and as a result I have really poor ankle mobility. Worse than the normal person. This has led me to never even being close to doing a pistol. I can do it assisted with a TRX or band and I can do a very poor one wearing Olympic lifting shoes but in only one leg. I really want to attend but also be able to participate and get something out of the pistol section. I have done the standard ankle mobility drills but none of them have ever made a dent no matter how often I do them.

I was hoping there are others that have experienced something similar themselves or worked with someone similar. I am not sure exactly how to progress to be able to get to the point where I can do a legit barefoot pistol. Hopefully there is someone that would be able to be able to provide some advice or dills.

My goal is to attend SFB in June and be able to participate and learn how to do the pistol better.

Any advice is much appreciated in advance.

I would suggest seeing a professional, especially one who might manipulate your ankle if needed. In my experience, ankle restrictions that don't respond to long term targeted soft tissue work and stretching are joint related. I've yet to see a good way to get the ankle moving on your own.
 
Duck walks, static hold in a low sit-squat are my first two suggestions.

Assisted ones done with a stick.

And if you can find someone to help manipulate would be a big help. Hopefully someone will chime in who has overcome this. Took me few to nail the pistol, but that was years ago. Duckwalks helped in my case.
 
@Skylar Rubalcaba, I would ask your doctor to suggest a physio/PT, and ask the physio for a course of treatment and exercises. Have a movement screen done now and again after PT.

If you can do a pistol holding a counterweight, that’s good enough. The pistol is taught but not tested.

-S-
 
Duck walks, static hold in a low sit-squat are my first two suggestions.

Assisted ones done with a stick.

And if you can find someone to help manipulate would be a big help. Hopefully someone will chime in who has overcome this. Took me few to nail the pistol, but that was years ago. Duckwalks helped in my case.
In the case of the static hold, is there a certain amount of time you would recommend? A few minutes? Or broken up into a few sets of a minute or so?
 
@Skylar Rubalcaba, I would ask your doctor to suggest a physio/PT, and ask the physio for a course of treatment and exercises. Have a movement screen done now and again after PT.

If you can do a pistol holding a counterweight, that’s good enough. The pistol is taught but not tested.

-S-
I don't have a PT or anything but I might have to look into that or utilize some of the AT's I work with
 
In the case of the static hold, is there a certain amount of time you would recommend? A few minutes? Or broken up into a few sets of a minute or so?

Just a couple minutes at a whack. Not even that long to start if your knees ankles hips start to complain a lot. Walk around a little and back down. Brush your teeth etc, just fit it in during the day, no need to make formal practice.
 
I don't have a PT or anything but I might have to look into that or utilize some of the AT's I work with
With your injury history, I think a doctor is the first place to start. You never know if you might be compensating for something that never healed properly, or who knows what else ...

-S-
 
All good suggestions - another point is to look at foot fascia and also stretch the flexor hallucis longus along with your calf stretches

Lastly high rep bodyweight calf raises once a week can assist in bringing blood flow to the lower body and help with tissue remodelling with the stretches
 
@Glen That is definitely something that I have neglected and should be doing more of. I'll give that a shot. And I don't typically do calf raises so maybe that will help some as well.
 
Just my 2c from my experience.

I have pretty restricted ankle mobility. The good news is, you can improve it, even if it feels that you are hitting a bony spot. The bad news is that it might take a year - but that is hard to say.

The ankles can take a lot of beating. Although the muscles are pretty small they can supported your bodyweight and more for an entire day. If you add martial arts or soccer to they can become pretty stiff.

What has helped me is the following. I have actually worked with a coach on this (@bodyflexx and @endrangestrength on instagram)

(a) about 2-3 times per week I use my lacrosse ball for "pin+pull" release. You place your ankle, calf, shin and bottom of the foot on top the ball and once you find a tender spot you do foot rotations (or move your toes) for 10-30 seconds. Do this on one side and then compare your ankle mobility on both sides.

(b) improve dorsiflexion: because the ankles can take a lot of beating they need a rather strong stimulus to change. So I use a 16 kg or 24 kg KB and put it on top of one of my knees. (Lunge or squatting on toes position). I then try to pull myself into dorsiflexion (you will feel it in you shins) and out of it (hello calfs) with pretty strong contractions. Every now and then I relax. This might take 30-60 seconds. It is pretty intense. Basically the weight helps with the stretch and then you need to contract both into and out of the stretch --> this will build the needed end range strength. I do two sets per side, once per week. This is enough. You might do 3 sets twice per week, but I feel that this is the maximum. Follow the drill with a couple of foot rotations.
This picture gives you and idea of it, although my working side heel is not on the floor yet: @bodyflexx on Instagram: “Dorsiflexion - once my nemesis I can see light at the end of the tunnel now. Attached my ‚then and now‘ pictures... I took the first…”

(c) every now then do some one legged rocking (google "original strength rocking" if you are not familiar with the movement. With one legged rocking you keep on leg straight behind you.)

Additionally you might want to strengthen your foot and ankle in general since you need to balance out the tension on all sides of the joint.

My dorsiflexion has improved a lot.
 
Aside from the sound advice to consult a professional, I noticed that one of my difficulties in attaining a pistol that I blamed on lack of mobility was actually lack of tension.

Early on, I made the mistake of trying to 'conserve' strength, and let the structures of my body handle my weight when I was descending. This would cause me to lose balance towards the bottom, which again I blamed on stiff ankles. Once I truly tensed up every muscle as hard as I could, and used my leg to actively "pull" myself down, I found that I had more usable range of motion than I suspected.

This is kinda hard to visualize based off of a description, but next time you try pistols (are medically clear to do so), try to ratchet up the tension before descending.
 
I agree with @Dasho. Although I sustained an left ankle injury 22 years ago that resulted in limited dorsiflexion, it turns out the injury also resulted in altered hip and core activation. It has been four years since I started my strength journey. I figured out that many of my problems with the pistol (and many other things) were due to lack of hip strength and core activation (a compensation for the ankle injury) rather than lack of ankle mobility.

I believe that due to four or so years of moderate diligent strength practice, my left ankle dorsiflexion has improved to where left and right are about equal now. However the improvements in hip and low back strength and core bracing (especially pelvic floor) have been the most critical components in my pistol progression.
 
Running, hiking and walking with flat shoes (fivefingers) has done a lot to improve my ankles the past couple of years, both of whom have been less than optimal since I was injured whilst playing football (soccer) in 1999/2000.
 
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