Ankle mobility and squat shoes

[ZZZZ]

I haven't been on the forum lately, but figured I would drop this quick suggestion to anyone that might benefit:

I've been barbell squatting at least 2-3x/week for a while now, and have seen massive benefits in terms of strength and physique. I probably have ~2-3 years or so squatting consistently, but just recently realized a huge deficiency in my form that was causing me all sorts of issues like back pain, knee pain, etc. that was limiting the amount that I could safely lift.

The issue was my ankle mobility. I recently bought some squatting shoes, which are basically just shoes with a hard bottom and a raised heel (0.5-1 inch of lift). These allow you to squat to depth without excessively widening your stance or increasing your toe angle (which I was doing to the extreme). I felt so much more stable today and could handle much more weight with ideal form. It was truly a gamechanger. Of course the long term solution is to work on my ankle mobility, which I've started to do, but in the meantime, these shoes have been working wonders. 

If you've been noticing similar issues when you attempt to squat, give some shoes with a raised heel a try. I bought the Adidas Powerlift 4's, which I would recommend. The lift on the heel is 0.6 inches I believe, which is on the lower side, but I can't imagine I would need much more. 

[aurum]

@ZZZZ yeah those ankles are a bitch.

I’ve got weightlifting shoes as well. They are a good intermediary between going from poor squat form -> good form, which can take several weeks or months.

The problem I see is a lot of people then don’t ever work on their mobility. The shoes provide them the ROM they need, so why bother?

To me that misses the point. Every moderately healthy human should be able to squat properly. Sure, your might have a bit of a wider or closer stance depending on your anatomy. But really the squat is just a test of healthy mobility for your body. So if you care about health, you should care about squat form.

 

[King Merk]

Spend a couple minutes in a seiza position every day.

If you have healthy ankles, hips, low back etc then you’ll be able to hold it for at minium a few minutes 

[ZZZZ]

18 hours ago, King Merk said:

Spend a couple minutes in a seiza position every day.

If you have healthy ankles, hips, low back etc then you’ll be able to hold it for at minium a few minutes 

I actually can't hold that for long without some tightness/pain in the front ankle, which makes something as simple as childs pose kind of uncomfortable for me. Definitely something I need to work on.

On 2/13/2022 at 5:18 PM, aurum said:

@ZZZZ yeah those ankles are a bitch.

I’ve got weightlifting shoes as well. They are a good intermediary between going from poor squat form -> good form, which can take several weeks or months.

The problem I see is a lot of people then don’t ever work on their mobility. The shoes provide them the ROM they need, so why bother?

To me that misses the point. Every moderately healthy human should be able to squat properly. Sure, your might have a bit of a wider or closer stance depending on your anatomy. But really the squat is just a test of healthy mobility for your body. So if you care about health, you should care about squat form.

 

Definitely agree... The other day was my first lift with the shoes, but I'll be working on that mobility the next couple of months. Based on my research there could be some degree of bony impingement at play, which is kind of annoying in terms of correcting it with a resistance band etc. but I definitely don't want to stay dysfunctional long-term.