Skating involves using the legs and ankles to perform numerous tasking jumps and rotations and landing on your feet and ankles. While everyone enjoyed skating on the ice, this sport has its own negative effect. In this post, we’ll explain why ice skates hurt ankle bone. But let’s kick off this post by discussing the causes of ankle strains.
Ankles And Skates: The Beginning Of Ice Skating
The lower part of the body contributes more to the skating moments while the upper body enables balance and safe-skating. Most skating activities are speed and flexibility, all of which directly impact the ankles. The human body receives signals or is acted upon by various force (mostly the muscular and skeletal parts), and this is why the reactions of skating tend to result in pains and fatigues (if performed in the wrong ways).
Generally, the way you perform your skating activities depends on your background in the field. Whether you are an expert or a beginner, your experience tells. Even an expert could perform the actions in the wrong way, resulting in ankle pains, which is why everybody needs to know the solutions to ankle pains if it occurred abruptly.
Since all skating activities depend on the action of the lower limbs (especially the ankle and foot); then, it is necessary to note the right way to skate without getting your ankle injured. All skating moments are directly related to your ankle; therefore, if you want to keep the fire on, you must know the “do and don’t” of skating – especially those that focus on the ankle. Unfortunately, people tend to perform some act in the wrong way when the right information is lagging, but reading this post will help you.
What Are The Causes Of Ankle Strains?
To discover the causes of ankle strains, we pinpoint the muscles that suffer the most hurt and soreness during skating drills. The first muscle is the peroneal muscle, and the second is the tibialis anterior.
Peroneal muscle shrinks as you lift your feet, and this produces pain on the exterior part of the ankles. According to Scientific findings, staying in the ice for a long time weakens that muscle and possibly lead to sprains. In contrast, tendon tibialis anterior wind through the exterior part of the Shinbone. Skating for long periods also causes the tibialis tissue to shrink in size.
When a skating training session ends, this muscle puts tension on the sinew, which causes pain in the outer part of the ankle and partly in the arches of the outer part of the foot. Since you are now aware of the cause of this pain in the muscles, you should consider a solution to this pain.
How Do You Treat Muscle Pain?
When ice skates hurt anklebone, try this solution to treat the areas you feel pain. Solutions suggested by the ice Skating Association include the use of a piece of wood, also known as a Dowel with a length of 24 inches and ½ width to work on the inner part of the ankles with throbbing muscle contractions, to improve blood circulation and stretch muscles fibers.
Ice Skating Safety Tips To Avoid Ankle Injury
There are plenty of ankle injuries that originate from the use of skates. Fortunately, preventing ankle damage is simple. Do the following things, to rid yourself of an ankle injury.
- Wearing Firm Boots: Wear firm boots that are fit, yet flexible enough to support the right flexure. Industry experts noted that most skaters’ boots are too rigid and suggest that the Uppers should curve a bit when you put a little pressure on it with your hand. To confirm you bought the right size of a boot, check that your big toe doesn’t touch the upper part of the boot.
- Lace-Up Appropriately: Lace your boots right and not too tightly to avert blisters, pains, and lace bite. To confirm how tight the lace-up is, place two fingers between the tongue and your ankle. Space there is supposed to hold just that two-fingers only.
- Wearing Orthotics: Experts suggests you use orthotics because most of these boots have no provision for arches. Orthotics are altered to your feet to avert discomfort in heel and Achilles tendonitis.
- Padding The Bony Parts: Place a silicone pad on the areas of the skate, which exert a burden on the vital skeletal regions of the ankle. You may also use Felts or Moleskin besides silicone.
- Stretching And Strength Routines: Do stretching drill and power-building exercises outside the course to improve balance, nurture power, and promote proper movement.
- Improve Balance And Strengthen Your Ankles: When you skate, you use some ankle muscles and foot muscles that you do not use often. That causes sore feet. To stop that from happening, strengthen your muscles. Get a wobble board to train you to improve balance and toughen the ankles, feet, and legs.
- Heat Mold The Boot: A new shoe hurts the feet. Get a rink official to Heat mold the boot, and shorten the time it will take that new boot to a break-in or grow to be soft. Once soft, you will enjoy wearing a boot that will not cause your ankle pain.
- Fall and Get Up the Right Way: Even when you fall as a skater, you must fall rightly to avoid serious injury. While skating and you notice that you are about to fall, get ready to fall; don’t fight it. Try and land on your buttocks that have some flesh and muscles that would act as a pillow. If you fall clumsily, you will be injured. You could try to get ready for a fall by learning how to fall in your home before skating.
- Do Not Overextend Yourself: Everyone was once a baby before we grew to adult size. That rule should also apply when you are skating. You aim to grow steadily, so do not overdo any skating activity and hurt your ankle.
Tips On How To Skate Without Ankle Pains
If you want to skate with no ankle pains, continue reading below as we explore how to achieve that.
- Bow the knees: Bowing the knees reduces your center of gravity to enhance your balance. Likewise, it enables you to manage actions and Skating position on Frost.
- Put on a shielding kit: These kits could save you from injuries when you are on ice. Wear elbow pads, and kneepads, to defend your body whenever you fall.
- Know how to stop on ice: Knowing how to stop is an absolute necessity because there are no brakes. If you stay on top speed wrongly, you could hit a barrier and get a severe injury. Learning to break could save you from possibly fatal injury.
- Falling on Ice: If you fall, fold in your hands and legs to avoid other skaters and stop them from injuring you.
- Practice makes perfect: Practice to gain proficiency in skating is the best. Learn how to balance, harmonize your movements, build physical strength. So, practicing for an extended period is your best friend.
Skating Rules That Could Prevent Injuries
- Participate in off-ice workouts to become supple. The aim is to learn how to be stable and dependable as you practice skating.
- Loosen up before a session and Wind down after practicing. Do active stretching with a lot of movements and strength-building exercises to warm up. To cool off after workouts, do motionless stretching, which means retaining a stretch throughout the break time.
- Get skates that fit Cozily, and whose leather has become soft. Overtly firm Boots reduces your activities, stress your ankle, knee, hip, and back muscles.
- Hone your Blades, but do not over sharpen it. If the edges are too sharp, it will pull instead of slide, which could cause injuries.
- Examine the ice for bits, lumps, bulges. If you are unaware of these things, they could be the origin of severe wounds due to errors and falls.
- Reduce the number of repeats when attempting the latest techniques. Intense landings stress the body. Reducing the repeat of Intense landings and raising training volume slowly: The U.S. Figure Skating Association says that skaters may get injured if they intensify training routines more than usual or increase the time they spend on ice by more than 10%, particularly during their beginner phase.
- Make movements equal to your ability. Rome was not built in a day. With years of rigorous drill and rehearsals on snow, you can do complicated steps securely.
- Halt skating whenever you are aching: Damages could occur during training routines if skaters overdo it. When you are in agony, first, rest, then use ice or elevation methods to cure the sore tendons. If pain persists, see a doctor.
Conclusion
We all know that injuries on the ice when skating can be scary, painful, and frightening for skaters, especially those who are just skating on the ice. Remember these tips before venturing out onto the ice to reduce your risk of injury: Be sure your boots are made from quality material and fit correctly to help your ankles stay erect.
