When we think of hockey training, we think of the legs and glutes – after all, legs “feed the wolf” as Herb Brooks once said. Generating power in hockey certainly requires strong glutes, quads, and hip muscles. Yet, one often overlooked but important part of an athlete’s anatomy is the ankle. If the ankle is weak and immobile, that will reduce the ability of the athlete to access the full extent of their potential power. Imagine force generated from the hips, glutes, and quads being pushed into the ground and that force traveling through a weak and/or immobile ankle. The athlete would lose a lot of that force potential as the ankle wouldn’t be able to help translate it into the ice (or ground in sprinting). 

Build ankle strength through heel-elevated lower body exercises and ground contact plyometrics. When athletes do a lunge or bulgarian with the heel elevated, it requires their ankle to be able to withstand the weight being pushed against it. The heel wants to collapse to the floor as the athlete balances on the front part of their foot. The ankle is very often the weak element in the lower body chain! By maintaining an elevated heel, the athlete builds strength in the ankle that can now absorb greater forces. Hockey players in particular can have weaker ankles (their feet are wrapped in a boot after all) and so it’s important for them to focus on this key joint and the muscles surrounding it. In addition to these strength exercises, hockey players should also work on ground contact focused plyometrics. These are plyometrics that require an athlete to “pop” off the ground quickly. Examples of these types of plyometrics range from bounding jumps to a simple skip movement. As hockey skating strides have evolved, more athletes have utilized a “pop” in their acceleration and crossovers. These skating techniques require greater plyometric bounce capabilities.

Greater ankle dorsiflexion mobility and strength helps increase quickness. Elite hockey players demonstrate greater dorsiflexion in their quick starts than peers playing at a lower level. Interestingly, the difference in dorsiflexion widens after the first stride, suggesting that the ability of the lesser skilled players to absorb force through the ankle is limited. These athletes might have strong quads and glutes but their inability to translate force into the ice limits their speed. A good test for athletes to determine if they have sufficient dorsiflexion is to put your foot flat, toes up against the wall, and then push your knee forward until you touch the wall. Move your foot away from the wall and continue doing this until the back heel comes off the floor. Measure the distance between the front of the foot to the wall. The elite skaters in this study referenced above achieved 24 degrees of ankle dorsiflexion. With an average adult shin length, this would require them to have their foot roughly 16 centimeters from the wall in the dorsiflexion test I just described. 

Better ankle mobility reduces injury risk by improving biomechanics and decreasing stress on other joints. As strength coach Mike Boyle puts it, “an immobile ankle causes the stress of landing to be transferred to the joint above, the knee.” A lack of dorsiflexion can also cause the knee to cave in during squatting, reducing force production and increasing injury risk. When the knee caves in during squatting or landing – a movement known as “knee valgus” – it can increase the risk of ACL tears. Finally and most importantly for hockey players, when the ankle is not mobile, it’s very difficult to get low and into a strong hockey stride position.

Ankles are a key component in lower body speed and strength production. Neglecting them leads to underperformance and suboptimal results. Improving ankle strength can increase