Articular Health For Feet & Gait
Learn how to improve your feet & gait by acquiring greater articular health
What is articular health?
When a lack of strength is not the real problem
Articular Health is a detailed way to understand & adapt your ability to control movement, based on what we can observe & feel.
There are many ways to express movement & some ways are better than others. Strength is not the primary factor for healthy joint articulation, which is why lesser articular health is the common thread for tightness or pain which spans everyone: old/young, fit/unfit, strong/weak.
Increasing strength does not tend to change lesser articular health into higher articular health because low articular health is not just an absence of strength.
Learn more about what you'll get as a member.
Healthy Joint Status
A healthy joint will feel a stretch on the opening side, and no pinching, discomfort, or blocking on the closing side.
Without this status, strength is simply added to an unhealthy joint. Additionally, regardless of strength, a closing side pain or problem will always be inflammatory.
Better Articular Strategy
A healthy joint will initiate & control movement from the closing side.
People move in different ways that look similar, though they are not equally healthy - that's why 2 people doing the same routine can have such different results or injury risk.
Because strengthening efforts will tend to use your current articular strategy & not change it, strength goals can sometimes further entrench lesser articular health. Learn about articular strategy for ankle/heel inversion:
High Active/Passive Ratio
A healthy joint can actively move into most of its range of motion using the desired articular strategy.
Every joint has 2 ranges of motion: 1) how far we can move it passively and 2) how far we can actively move it. This ratio is an important factor for higher articular health & typically won't change without specific programming.
Since we can't gain strength in a passive range of motion, learning to make it active is a crucial step for anyone with a low active/passive ratio.
Sufficient range of motion
A healthy joint is able to actively articulate a sufficient amount for the activity it needs to do.
While seemingly the most straightforward aspect of Articular Health, most people have little awareness of their active ROM for the fundamental aspects of gait such as big toe flexion/extension, ankle inversion/eversion, or hip rotation.
Most people have never specifically assessed for, or known how to improve any of these articular qualities. Instead most effort goes into resting & generalized strengthening with unreliable outcomes.
Everyone I assess with foot pain, or problems in gait, exhibits one or more of these limitations in Articular Health.
Your foot problems were my foot problems
For years after my foot injury (a crushed midfoot), my doctors and other clinical providers could not help me walk normally because they were primarily focused on strength.
They were unable to interpret the Articular Health status of my joints, or create targeted programming to add back the qualities which were missing.
While I did get stronger, and could do things like easily balancing on a single leg, I was still unable to comfortably walk even a single block.
This was because more strength didn't address my real problem, which was lesser articular health.
Over time I learned how to evaluate & create programming which improved my articular health, and successfully resolved all of my foot & gait complaints. 
The assessments, programming and support available within Articular Health will help you positively adapt problems related to feet & gait.
Once you have re-acquired higher articular health, all the other things you want to do for strength and activity will be much easier.
Hit the EXPLORE button above to learn move - and I hope to see you inside Articular Health!
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