If you are looking to maximise the support for your ankle with taping, well, look no further, because the basketweave taping technique is exactly what you are after.
G’Day Guys and Girls, It’s Anthony from GrandStand Sports Clinic with another taping tutorial. This time we are looking at really stabilising the ankle using the basketweave taping technique.
This is one of a series of videos that we make on taping techniques to help you better support your athletes through taping.
The basketweave ankle taping technique is simply the best way that you can stabilise an athletes ankle, and it should be reserved only for those who need maximal support. The basketweave technique builds on a lot of the practices that we use in our standard ankle technique, so it might be a good idea to have a look at that video first, if you haven’t seen it already and why not consider subscribing so that you don’t miss out on any of the videos that we post. That said, lets dive straight into the basketweave ankle technique so that you can maximise the ankle support for your athlete.
Before we start our basketweave technique, lets make sure that the ankle is in the right position and that the athlete is holding the ankle at 90 degrees. We’ll start our basketweave taping just as we started our basic ankle taping, with an anchor above the ankle. We are also going to place an anchor across the top of the foot, just behind the metatarsal heads. Again, we’ll start with a stirrup that runs from the medial side to the lateral side. And then, a stirrup running from the medial part of the foot to the lateral foot.
We’ll then continue this pattern, alternating between vertical and horizontal stirrups as we work our way up the foot.
Remember to overlay the tape by a half each time to maximise the support.
As we alternate the horizontal and the vertical stirrups, you’ll see the pattern forming around the heel which gives the basketweave taping its name.
You’ll also understand why this taping is so supportive, given the number of stirrups that we are placing on the ankle. Here, the basketweave pattern is clear to see.
As we’ve completed the basketweave, we’ll then continue our ankle as we did with our standard ankle, starting with a figure 6.
Then, starting from the lateral malleolus, we’ll do a half figure 8, going underneath the foot, across the foot and finishing on the medial malleolus. We can then finish off with a pair of heel locks.
Once we have finished our heel locks, it’s simply a matter of tidying our taping by going over the loose ends of the tape with some anchors. We can do two anchors across the front of the foot and then probably three anchors across the ankle.
Use your hands to conform the tape to the ankle and then check the movement of the ankle with the athlete.
So there you have the basketweave, and you can tell just by the amount of tape that we’ve used how much support this will offer the athlete. Use this technique sparingly and only for those athletes where you absolutely want to maximise the support of their ankle.
If you have any questions about the basketweave technique, whack then down in the comments. If you liked the video, press the ‘Like’ button, consider subscribing and we’ll see you in the next video.
