Squats - Tight ankles

I've always had pain in the back after doing squats and realized that I have tight ankles and this results in butt wink when doing them.

I've come across with a little hack; putting small plates under my heels to lift them up a bit. I filmed myself with and without the plates, and it seems like that this solves the butt wink. For the lower back pain, I don't know, because I haven't tried it under load yet. Hopefully, it fixes that too.

My question is that doing squats with heels lifted up a bit is as effective as regular ones?
Will my ankles loosen up over time if I keep doing squats like this? If not, can this be a long-term solution?

Thanks in advance.

[QUOTE=kisrobyyy;1647247323]I've always had pain in the back after doing squats and realized that I have tight ankles and this results in butt wink when doing them.

I've come across with a little hack; putting small plates under my heels to lift them up a bit. I filmed myself with and without the plates, and it seems like that this solves the butt wink. For the lower back pain, I don't know, because I haven't tried it under load yet. Hopefully, it fixes that too.

My question is that doing squats with heels lifted up a bit is as effective as regular ones?
Will my ankles loosen up over time if I keep doing squats like this? If not, can this be a long-term solution?

Thanks in advance.[/QUOTE]

As effective for what?

Loaded stretching of the calves will help loosen up the ankles in my experience.

You can do this long term but if you find a heel elevation you like and want to stick with you may be better off purchasing heeled weightlifting shoes.

This helps due to improving dorsiflexion range of motion. If you want to work on this directly then I recommend watching this video:

[youtube]WkdXHQ74khI[/youtube]

When I saw the title of the topic, I've thought about Tom Merrick and his video about ankles.
I click and I see Tom Merrick's video. Yeah! Nice!

There's a host of posterior coordination deficiencies along the kinetic chain of a squat from the feet to the neck through the hip and around the back. Often what can be an apparent deficiency at one point signaled by discomfort can be sourced at a respective opposite end in the dynamics of the kinetic chain.