Slant Board Calf Stretch

The Slant Board Calf Stretch is a stretching exercise used to improve flexibility and range of motion in the calves. This stretch is performed with a slant board, which is typically a wedge-shaped platform that can be adjusted to different angles. To start, the exerciser stands on the slant board with the balls of their feet on the lower surface while the heels rest on the higher surface. The exerciser then leans forward and holds the stretch for 20-30 seconds before relaxing.

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This is Brent coming at you with another

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go over the slant board stretch as an alternative to the wall stretches I showed

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you before. Although that's a great stretch and it's something that you

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should have in your repertoire, to get the most out of it is actually fairly

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complicated to teach. So I'm going to show you guys how this stretch fulfills all of

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our criteria for a great stretch. It supports the bottom of the foot so we

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don't take the chance of stretching out those intrinsics of the foot, those

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intrinsic flexors that support the medial arch. We're going to keep the hip in

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a neutral position, so none of this long sit, pulling up with a strap, which puts

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the hip into flexion, knee into total extension, pulling up into dorsiflexion

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which has the potential to over stretch that sciatic nerve over time. We can put

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a considerable amount of force through a slant board, right. We have our entire

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body weight contributing to this force, and lastly, this is where things get

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really really simplified, in that wall stretch I had to work really hard to get

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somebody from that everted, turned-out position, that we're trying to correct

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with a calf stretch, into this inverted and dorsiflexed position. With a slant

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that becomes two simple queues. I think if you have tried that wall stretch I

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showed, you realize it takes a little bit of effort. I'm going to have my friend, Yvette,

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come out, she's going to help me demonstrate. So, first things first, the

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reason I've never showed this stretch before, I hadn't found these OPTP slants

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before, and this is not just an endorsement for a product, slant boards

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had the tendency to be really expensive, like in that hundred to two hundred

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dollar range, it makes it very hard for me to look at a client or a patient and

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go, 'hey I need you to get this for home', not to mention some of the slant boards

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I've had in the past were a little rickety on top of being expensive. These

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OPTP slants you can get on Amazon for 21 bucks, and it comes with two, if I beat

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them up it doesn't matter a terrible amount, they seem to last

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three to six months anyway, and then I just buy another set. I can refer a

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client to get these for home, so I know that in between our sessions they're

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continually working on gaining that dorsiflexion. Now, let's get back to the

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queues on this stretch so I can show you how simple this really is. Rather

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than that wall stretch where we had to turn the foot in and work on tibia on

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foot inversion and take a step sideways and do all this queuing, all I have to

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ask Yvette to do is go, "okay stand up on the slant board, hold on to this for

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support." She's going to turn her feet a little pigeon-toed, so pinky toe pointing

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forward, or fifth metatarsal pointing forward, and then once she gets into a

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little bit of rotation this way, all I need to do is externally rotate her legs

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a little bit to pop her arches back up, and I can do that with a simple queue of

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squeeze your glutes, and stand up nice and tall. Alright, so now we have a nice calf

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stretch. We have the hip in neutral position, so no sciatic nerve issues, we

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have the foot in inversion, so that's not a problem. We have a considerable

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amount of weight with our whole body weight in the stretch, and it's

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absolutely no effort for the patient or client. This actually, for the

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most part, unless somebody has arthrokinematic dysfunction that you're going to

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have to take care of, I actually find this more effective than doing manual

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stretching on a patient or client. Now, the only problem with the OPTP slant

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is that the angle isn't very steep. So this is great for somebody who just came

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in who is very tight, but after a few weeks of doing this they're going to get as

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much as they can out of the OPTP slant and we're going to have to find something

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a little bit more intense. So we're going to trade in two pieces of cheap foam, and

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by cheap I just mean less expensive, which I love, for another piece of cheap

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foam, which is the half foam roll. So if I take this half foam roll and put it flat

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side up, when Yvette comes and steps on it and does the exact same queues,

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she's pinky toe pointed forward, she gets her heels down on the

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floor, and she can be leaned back a little bit, that's okay and then she

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squeezes her glutes, we're right back to having a nice slant board, bottom of foot

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supported, she's in that inverted position. Squeeze your glutes, and

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you can see here that the half foam roll is actually a fairly steep angle. So this

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gives her a lot more to work on. For Yvette, personally, I would actually give her

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the half foam roll for home, rather than the OPTP slants because the OPTP

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slants looked a little not challenging enough for her. So there you go.

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I want you to learn that wall stretch. That wall stretch is important

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in the previous video. It's important that you have a technique that requires

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absolutely no equipment. All of you who have runners with tight calves who

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end up doing these events and need some way to warm up beforehand, they need

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something with no equipment, but for your clubs get something that you can use for

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a slant board, it will make your life a ton easier, and then make sure that if

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your clients have lower leg dysfunction, your patients have lower leg dysfunction

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and some sort of ankle, foot, lower leg injury, that you get this stuff for home

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so that they can continue working on it. I hope you get a huge results, I

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Slant Board Calf Stretch

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Slant Board Calf Stretch

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Please contact us through the
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