Squatting w/ a jacked ankle

[mypeggy]

Background: 37yrs old, bad ankle due to endless marine corps boots/hikes... sprained a handful of times... Self-diagnosed to a peroneal tendon sublixation and plantar fascitis/achilles tendonitis on my left ankle/foot.. Looking to get surgery done in the next year or two.. Anyhow, to work around this I've been doing leg press, lunges, leg machine work for the past year.. but really miss squats and want to do them..

Few days ago, Squat University on YouTube posted a short clip about toe squats for people with mobility/ankle issues.. tried it earlier this week w/ a slant board and could tell the tendon wasn't popping out of its groove anymore..which is good.. but was still getting some tingles at bottom of my heel due to plantar fascitis?

So, I tried switching up the weight distribution on the bad foot.. for the descent- about 70% of the weight geared torwards the balls of my feet.. and about 30% geared torwards my heels on the descent... For the ascent, I had about 90% of the weight torwards my heels and about 10% on the balls of my feet.. this seems to work but the fact that im doing this and cant generate enough force w/out discomfort using a tripod.. will probably just result in more problems when I increase the load in the future.. thoughts?

 

[annointed1980]

@mypeggy Yeah I was squatting really deep and getting up there with weight before one knee started some clicking and instability. Always had one inflexible ankle and pain/stiffness and found out recently I've got tarsal coalition on one side (one foot a couple bones fused in utero). I'm actually fortunate compared to some people who have it as it can be quite debilitating, but makes my ankle gets little micro sprains after hikes. So I've had to be a bit careful getting back into them and just go to parallel and not go quite as heavy or progress slower. Previously I had been doing 5x5 and went quite high before reset and then after that just kept increasing like crazy. Even with my heels lined up I've definitely noticed my knees point at different angles no matter how hard I hard to push them out equally

 

[jesse67]

@mypeggy I never get the whole squat on a board or heel on a plate thing, it's just not stable enough and a recipe for disaster. Invest in some lifting shoes with raised heel, the sole will be nice and hard and will limit ankle roll etc and you will still be squatting on a firm, safe and flat floor. Try some other variations, fronts squats, with a SSB etc, it might shift the weight around enough to make a better difference.