My homework from the “Walking Well” program today was to challenge my ankles by walking on terrain that is not flat and level ground. To show you what I mean, I brought you along on part of my off-road walking adventure.
The online course called “Walking Well: A Stepwise Approach to an Everyday Movement” (found at https://tuneup.fit/walk-with-brock ) has really been expanding my walking ideas and abilities (if you use that link, a portion of the sale goes to support my walking habit). And even if you don’t enroll I still encourage you to follow my example and get off the sidewalks and challenge all of your walking parts!
As my biomechanist friend Katy Bowman says: “Every geometry (shape) your body assumes creates a different load. Adding hills (both up and down) as well as slopes that challenge your ankles (think of the ankle’s experience walking the sloped shore of a beach) uses your body—and creates loads—in ways not available in the flat-flat-flat settings most of us are used to.”