Feet and Tango - a collection of foot exercies
A bunch of exercises for dancing feet. The exercises are listed in approximate order of difficult starting with the easiest, first. These exercises shoult NOT hurt, instead they are healthly workouts for muscles, tendons, ligaments and joints.If you experience regular foot pain please consult a professional such as a physio, injury specialist, etc.
The number of repititions for each exercise is up to you, but 10 reps per foot seems to work well.
Ankle Circles
Sit in a straight-backed chair or stand on one leg.
Hold a foot feet slightly off the ground and slowly circle your ankle to the right and then to the left.
Point and Flex
The classic, best done wearing low-heeled shoes with a stiff-ish sole. The sole of the shoe will resist the movements and add to the workout. Sit or stand on one leg. Point your foot (the one without your weight on it), then flex your foot. Repeat.To increase the difficulty you can use a theraband to create more movement resistance.
Reach and Return
Sit up straight on the edge of a chair. You can do this in socks, with bare feet or with shoes on. Keeping both feet flat on the floor at all times, slowly reach one foot out along the floor away from you to the front to your limit, then pull the foot back and repeat. This is quite a low impact exercise that is good preparationg (over a period of weeks) before doing some of the more difficult exercises.Controlled Rise
Stand with both of your feet flat on the floor. Slowly rise up to free your heels from the floor as much as is comfortable. Descend slowly back down to put your feet flat on the floor. Do this on both feet.Once you can do both feet well then you might wish to try on one foot, but beware this is much more difficult.
Big Toe Lifts
Sit or stand with both feet flat on the floor. Lift your big toe off the floor, leaving the rest of your toes still on the floor - ONLY the big toe. Up and down.Toe Crawl
For this you need a theraband, scarf, long sock or some such thing. Put the material on the floor and use the toes of one foot to gather up the material by crawling along it with your foot.Doming
This is seriously difficult and you can only do this if you have good, strong, dexterous feet.Do in socks or bare feet. Foot is flat on the floor. During this exercise your foot does not move very much and your toes HARDLY MOVE. Slowly lift the middle of the front of your foot off the floor (the maximum is usually about 5mm) using the muscles of the front of your foot. Then relax.
Yes, you barely moved, but if you are doing this properly it is pretty difficult.