[pct-l] Ankles

[Eric Lee]

Steel-Eye wrote:
>
Diane is correct in her assessment that typical hiking boots contribute
little, or nothing, to resist ankle-turning.  The low style boots are about
6" in height.  Medium heights are maybe 8" high.  Neither is much higher
than the distance from the ground to the center of the ankle joint and they
won't contribute significantly to absorbing torque about the ankle
regardless of how tightly they are laced.  They may feel nice and snug and
firm - a physiological advantage - but they will not significantly resist
even a mild turn, let alone a 2g - 3g turn possible with a misstep on the
trail.
>

For most people, I agree that boots are overkill and not necessary.  But
speaking strictly for myself, I believe that my mid-height boots do help
compensate for deficiencies in my personal biomechanics and I'm quite happy
with them.  I'll describe my situation not because I believe that everyone
is like me but because maybe it'll help a couple of people with similar
issues.

My specific problem is that I naturally tend to walk with my toes pointed a
bit inward and with my weight landing mostly on the outside edges of my
feet.  This is called excessive supination or maybe even pigeon-toed.  In
that position my ankles are already primed for folding over and it takes
hardly anything at all to cause an accident.  I can (and have) rolled my
ankle walking down a perfectly smooth sidewalk.  This tendency is more
pronounced when I'm tired and/or walking downhill.  Seriously, when I'm
tired my feet tend to land in orientations that anyone else would have to
work hard to duplicate.

Ankle sprains for me can be quite catastrophic.  The last serious one I
suffered (thankfully several years ago now) was in the Glacier Peak
wilderness when I was doing a section between Stevens Pass and Stehekin.
That year I was fascinated with all the talk of hiking in running shoes and
decided to try it for myself with some trail-runners.  I severely sprained
my ankle on a moderately downhill, mostly smooth section of trail . . . for
no apparent reason.  Seriously, I laid there in the dirt, staring back up
the way I had come, asking myself, "What.  The.  Hell?"

There were no decent bailout options available so I had to wrap it heavily
in athletic tape and keep walking.  Thank goodness I had hiking poles.  Four
days later the ankle was still covered in purple and green bruising and it
took me until the next spring and a lot of physical therapy to put it back
together.  My podiatrist told me that if I pulled a stunt like that again my
hiking career might be permanently over.

I realize that one personal anecdote doesn't prove anything but as you can
imagine I'm a little gun-shy about trail-runners myself.  Fine for other
people - scary for me.

The boots I use have collars about 5.5 inches high (measured from the inside
of the boot to the top of the collar) and extend about two inches above my
ankle joint.  They don't significantly reinforce or immobilize my ankles
during a normal stride.  I agree on that point, and that's actually a good
thing.  But they do a couple of useful things for me.  The first is that the
touch of the collar of the boot around my ankle provides some extra
proprioception that helps me stay a little more aware of how my feet are
oriented and how much danger I'm in.  The extra feedback helps me focus on
correcting my stride.

The second benefit is that during a drastic ankle-rolling event, the collar
of my boots are just high enough to prevent the worst of the
hyper-extension.  That is, they don't prevent minor sprains but they do
mechanically prevent hike-ending sprains.  Since the Glacier Peak incident
I've had a few other accidents where I ended up with minor sprains but my
boots saved me from catastrophic damage.  Again, this is all anecdotal, but
it's been my experience.

A couple of other things have helped me as well.  As I noted on another
thread, during the past year I've spent some time walking on a
heavy-equipment road made of 3 or 4-inch rock.  That's a very unstable
surface for walking but it's given me a lot of practice in ankle control and
has helped firm up the muscles and ligaments.  

Another thing that's helped was a recent discovery that just focusing on
pointing my toes outward significantly enhances my stability.  In the past I
tried to focus on walking flat-footed (rather than putting all my weight on
the outside edges of my feet) and it didn't work very well because I'd just
go back to my natural gait when I stopped paying attention.  Last year I
figured out that if I think about pointing my toes outward when I walk it
accomplishes basically the same thing and it's an easier command for my feet
to handle.  I'm getting better about doing that habitually and
unconsciously.

Maybe someday I'll be ready to try trail-runners again, but definitely not
yet.  I'm enjoying my recent streak of sprain-free hiking and I don't want
to mess with a good thing.

Eric