Category
Foot & Ankle Pain
Toe scrunches for Ankle Medial Sling Muscles
This video demonstrates a targeted foot and lower leg exercise designed to activate the flexor hallucis longus and flexor digitorum muscles using a light resistance band.
The band is anchored under the calf and looped over the heel, and the movement involves a sequence of scrunching, pointing, and unpointing the foot to engage the medial sling muscles of the lower leg.
The focus is on precise movement rather than resistance level, as the goal is to properly recruit the muscle chain running from the upper leg down through the foot.
This exercise helps reduce strain on the gastrocnemius, soleus, and Achilles complex while improving overall load distribution throughout the lower leg and foot.
Video Transcript:
This exercise is to target the flexor hallucis longus and flexor digitorum.
So you got a light band anchored underneath the calf.
And then you pull the band up and over the heel and around.
And you can anchor it up and through here.
And then as you do this, you scrunch so you get those foot knuckles showing.
And then we're going to point and then we're going to unpoint and then unscrunch. Scrunch, point, unpoint, unscrunch.
Great!
It doesn't matter how much resistance we have here because that's less relevant than the actual movement here to achieve getting those medial sling muscles that start up here, finishing in the foot in order to reduce that load off of that gastroxolias achilles complex and improve load distribution throughout the lower leg and the foot.