Jeff Langmaid tests whether a single chiropractic adjustment to the ankle or foot can immediately increase squat strength and ankle mobility. Limited ankle dorsiflexion often causes heel lift and poor squat form. He explores whether one HVLA adjustment translates to measurable performance gains.
Can a lower limb adjustment, specifically adjustments to the ankle, foot, or tib fib region, immediately improve squat strength and ankle range of motion? And it's a pretty fantastic question because in chiropractic practice, we talk all the time, just about every week on this podcast as well, about things like mobility, movement quality, joint function, performance, and helping people move better. And when we see a patient who has limited ankle dorsiflexion, a poor squat pattern, heel lift, knee collapse, limited depth, you name it, forward trunk lean, it's natural to think, oh, if I can improve their ankle, biomechanics, maybe we can improve the squat. Clinically, that makes sense. This study goes one step farther. Not only can manipulation help somebody feel looser, you know, not just can it help improve movement in general. So it's really going— I'm going to say one step farther than that, saying, can one session of a high-velocity, low-amplitude adjustment to the lower limb produce a measurable immediate improvement in one-rep max back squat strength and ankle dorsiflexion?
