Imagine those two small delicate structures – your feet – pounding around a hard surface for hours. It is almost unbelievable that they can take it. Occasionally, every tennis player gets some kind of foot problem – calluses, heel spurs, flat feet, Achilles tendon problems or twisted ankles. Almost all tennis courts in Los Angeles are made from concrete, and it’s almost logical that the pounding and stress on your feet can create future problems.
Most of the times, all the above injuries happen because of some kind of dysfunction in the proper movement of your feet – excessive pronation (angling the foot towards the inside edge) or supination (angling towards the outside edge), or restricted motion caused by tight or shortened calves. A foot strike should be heal-to-toe, and anything deviating from that causes tremendous stress on the feet, because they are not constructed for that.
It is very easy to see that if you make thousands and thousands of steps and direction changes with feet that are not functioning properly, that other body parts and joints will have to compensate. You may not feel anything right then, but several months or years later, a “sudden” knee or hip problem arises. Meanwhile, it all started with your feet.
Thus it is extremely important to take a good care of your feet. Besides giving them some love and a little massage sometimes, I recommend a few simple restoring exercises as a prevention of future overuse injuries.
Foot Circles and Flexes
These exercises strengthen the extending and flexing muscles in your lower leg and restore the flexibility in your ankle. Lie on your back with legs straight and feet pointing towards the ceiling. Bend your right leg, bring your knee towards the chest and hug it with your arms. Now keep making clockwise circles with your right foot, in the biggest range of motion possible. Don’t hurry and don’t move your knee or hip, all the movement should be coming only from your ankle. Do 30-40 circles and change the direction. Then switch legs. In the second exercise, flex your right foot (bring your toes towards your knee) as much as you can, and then point your foot as far away from your knee as you can. Again, the movement comes only from your ankle. Repeat 30-40 times, and change the side.
If you find these exercises pretty difficult, you might have a little imbalance developing. The good thing is that you know about it now, and by doing the circles and points regularly, you get your feet into a good shape.
Besides rebalancing your ankles, you need to take a good care of your hips as well. Keep them strong by doing lunges, squats and windmills, and continue stretching your hips with the pigeon stretch.
More rebalancing and strengthening exercises for your hips will come soon. If you subscribe to this article (with the subscribe button above the article), you will get notified when the future articles arrive.
If you enjoyed reading this article, you might also enjoy following articles:
* 5 easy tips how to stay hydrated for optimum tennis performance
* How to prevent groin pull
* Prevention of shin splints with myo-fascial release
Comments
Thank you, Suzanna, very helpful.
You are so welcome, more good stuff will come :-)
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