Fitness & Health

How do you stay in shape while recovering from an ankle injury?

By adrian ⋅ June 4, 2008 ⋅  Email This Post ⋅  Print This Post ⋅ Post a comment

About 4 weeks ago I sprained my ankle. This wasn’t a new occurrence for me, but no two ankle sprains are ever alike. It’s a little like that Chinese proverb about walking in a river - you can never step in the same river twice - each sprain is a little different, with different effects, and leading to different recovery times. The one major impact this has had on me this time is the effect on my cardio. Up until the injury, I was on a pretty good track towards preparing for some upcoming runs. So the challenge (and the risk) I’ve been running (no pun intended) is how can I at least stay in decent shape while I’m sidelined with an ankle injury?

You don’t. You REST.

If you’ve injured one of your joints, be it an ankle, knee, or even your wrist, shoulder or elbow, you’ll probably know that one of the hallmark treatments for these injuries is RICE: Rest, Ice, Compression, and Elevation.

A little rest is always good for just about any training program, and until you get clearance to do otherwise from a healthcare professional (I’m more of a pro at being the healthcare patient) the rest will do you well, particularly with making sure that you don’t further aggravate your injury.

Alternative cardio workouts

Once you’ve gotten that “ok” to restart some activities, what other options are there? Number one, you should be completing whatever rehabilitation exercises you’ve been taught by your trusted physiotherapist. But once you’re on your way to recovery, there are a few other ways you can help yourself stay in shape and at least start to regain that cardio you worked so hard to build.

You may want to try one of these seated aerobic workouts featured here, here, or here. But I’ll let you learn what you can from those pros. Me, I’ve opted for some other options.

Swimming with a little help from water-wings

Putting the water wings between your knees is a definite help to preventing you from flapping your feet up and down which can be hard on your ankles in the early stages of recovery. I’ve found this to be a little risky because unless you’ve learned how to swim using just your arms, it won’t come naturally at first and you may find that your natural tendency is to get your legs and feet to help you move along. But if you’re comfortable in the water already, and have the clearance from your physio, swimming is an excellent workout for building cardio.

High-rep weight training

Doing high reps with low weights is another good option for staying in decent shape. Again, you’ll want to make sure you have the go-ahead from your physio and you’ll also want to be careful - the last thing you want to do is to re-injure your ankle just from carrying barbells from the rack to the bench.

Depending on how regularly you were working out beforehand, you may want to gradually ease back into your program. It’s always good to mix up your routine, but be sure to do exercises you are already familiar with, maybe just try it with less weight so that you can do upwards of 12-15 or even 15-20 reps. By doing familiar exercises, you stand a better chance of not churning your body awkwardly in any sort of way that might aggravate your injury or slow your recovery.

You might even find that the rest you took (you DID rest, right?) has not only helped your injury heal, but also given you that much needed resting period to break through your training plateau.

Yoga - for treatment and prevention

Depending on the flexibility, stability, and mobility of your ankle, you may have limited ability to do any yoga, but keeping limber and flexible is definitely worth the effort. One thing you may notice when you start coming back from an ankle injury is the rest of your body may be compensating for any weakness your ankle may still have while in your rehab process. The effect of this can be other parts of your body start getting sore, getting strained, or overused to the point where you have some misalignment.

For example, you have difficulty putting full weight on your ankle in a flexed position so you walk straight-legged. The weight you put on a straight leg strains your knee. The strain on your knee causes your hamstring to get sore. Your sore hamstring pulls on your lower back….get the idea?

Staying loose and limber will be one way to help prevent further injuries.

Watch what you eat!

This one’s tough and for some (i.e. me) takes the most discipline. Getting (and staying) in shape isn’t just about what you do, it’s also about what you eat. The thing with going for regular runs or keeping to a training program is that it often gives you some leeway in terms of what you can get away with eating. You burn lots of calories when you run, so you can afford to eat more with less effect. The challenge is to change your eating patterns when you’re forced to change your activity patterns and there’s no easy way about doing this other than being disciplined.

Fight the temptation to eat the cookie and go for the fruit instead. Opt for almonds or walnuts with a vegetable wrap instead of those oh-so-good kettle chips that go so well with that clubhouse sandwhich. It’s much easier said than done (believe me I know this for a fact), but it may make the biggest difference in helping your body out when it comes time to getting back to doing your real workouts.

And again, it’s all about discipline. It’s up to you to make the conscious decision to choose what you eat and maybe more importantly what you don’t.

Anything else?

That’s some of what I’ve been doing so far to stay in shape while recovering from this latest ankle injury. And so far so good, I’d say. I’m well on my way with recovery and am still keeping in decent shape.

What else would you do? Or what else have you done? What wouldn’t you do?

Tags: fitness, injuries, rehab, training