Foot Strength: Exercises Every Runner Should Be Doing
Runners who do foot strengthening exercises are 2.4x less likely to get injured than runners who don’t do them.
That sounds like a pretty big deal to me…
The primary goal of foot exercises is to improve how well your foot absorbers and handles forces throughout your run.
Here are some of the specific foot strengthening exercises I recommend to my running patients to help prepare them for the demands of running:
Diagonal Calf Raises
The calves absorb MULTIPLE TIMES your body weight in force every step while running. Preparing your calves for this is extremely important. The diagonal calf raises adds multi-planar stability, which is essential for trail running.
Towel Scrunches
The towel scrunching exercise helps build up strength in the bottom of your foot, decreasing stress on your plantar fascia.
Foot doming
The Foot Doming exercise teaches you how to form a proper arch, which stabilizes and strengthens the foot.
Toe Yoga
Toe Yoga helps you restore the proper function of your foot, the ability to splay. If your foot cannot splay, it is harder for it to absorb the shock of running each step.
You don’t have to do these exercises…
In reality, you do not need to be doing THESE exercises. There are literally thousands of exercises you can choose from, these are just the ones that I like to see my patients and clients doing. But you should be doing SOME form of strength training. Both for injury prevention AND to improve your performance.
In general, I recommend some form of:
Lower Leg Specific Training
Hip and Core Specific Training
Core Training (primarily “anti-rotation” of '“anti-movement“ exercises)
Compound Movements emphasizing the Posterior Chain Strength Exercises (glutes and hamstrings)
Basic Upper Body Strength exercises (1-2 pressing and pulling exercises)
Foot Strength
Cover all these bases and you are bound to feel better and run with more confidence
This is part 6 of our Running Injury Prevention series. Missed the First 5 Parts? Find them here
All runners should have 1-2 strength sessions per week if they want to run faster and further while remaining injury-free.
Here are the exercise categories I start all my runners with:
Lower Legs
Hips and Thighs
Core
Compound Movements (integrating the trunk and lower body)
Upper Body Exercises
Foot Strength
Author: Dr Mark Murdoch, Chiropractor and Co-Founder at Base Camp Sport and Spine in Vernon, BC.
Mark Murdoch is a Doctor of Chiropractic with a Master’s Degree in Sports Medicine.
Contact: drmurdoch@basecampclinic.com
Instagram: Base.Camp.Doc