Sprained ankle

Spraining your ankle is easy, we've all done it at some point. You don't have to be playing football or other sports to sprain your ankle, a slip on the way to the toilet can be enough. Keeping your body moving and strengthening the muscles around your ankle will minimise the risk of a sprain, but sometimes bad luck can happen even to the most fit person.

If it does, there are a few things you can do to minimise the pain and shorten the recovery time. Elevate your foot, meaning your ankle should be higher than your heart. This takes away some of the pain and reduces the swelling.

Once this is done, you should wrap an elasticated bandage around the foot to reduce bleeding, which helps the injury to heal faster. Leave the bandage in place for about 15 minutes. If you feel that your foot is falling asleep, you have wrapped it too tightly, make sure to loosen the bandage a little.

To get back into training faster, it is common to tape the ankle. This is done to provide extra support and reduce the risk of pulling up or aggravating the injury. However, taping a sprained foot is time-consuming and it can also be very painful to remove the tape after a sweaty workout.

A comfortable vulcanised protector is recommended instead. An ankle protector is easy to put on and take off, easy to clean and much cheaper than hundreds of rolls of tape.