Introduction
Welcome back! If you are new here, I recommend checking out Part 1 before continuing. In Part 2, we’ll move on to the next exercise and how to incorporate that exercise into our first – knee bends.
Knee Bends and Dealing with Soreness:
How are you doing with your knee bends? Feeling any pain in your joints or muscles: some in your muscles, a minor discomfort in your joints? This is normal.
If the soreness in your joints is extreme, or you’re experiencing sharp pain, and pain medicine doesn’t help, stop completely. Wait until the pain subsides completely. This may take one or two weeks. If it goes beyond that, check with your doctor.
Otherwise, let’s move on to the next exercise.
Next on the agenda: Calf Raises
No! Not that kind of calf!
Yeah, those are them!
The calf controls the movement of the foot, and is made up of three muscle groups: the Gastrocnemius, the Soleus and the Plantaris. While each muscle group serve separate function, together they allow you to point your toes, help you walk or run, and help you maintain balance when you’re standing.
While Knee Bends target the thigh (quadriceps), calf raises target, the ahh… Oh yeah, the calf muscles.
Performing Calf Raises
Performing calf raises is rather simple:
- Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart. Maintain good posture with your shoulders back, head up, and eyes forward. Note: Use a wall or the back of a chair to assist in maintaining balance.
- Rise up onto your toes, attempting to bring your heels as close to your calves as possible.
- Hold the position for a moment, then lower your heels back down to the ground.
Remember to Focus: Try closing your eyes. Feel your calf muscles tighten at the top of the movement and relax at the bottom.
Sets and Reps: Start off doing one or two sets of 10 repetitions. See how that feels.
If in a day or two your calves feel fine, crank up the reps to 15 or 20. Then if you’re still pain-free after that, and have little or no problem walking, take the next step.
Instead of increasing repetitions, increase the number of sets
Your calves can take a beating. You use them constantly. How often do you move your foot or stand or walk? So you may be suprised if you can knock out 30 or 40 reps without stopping. But again, don’t overdo it. Start off slow. Test the waters before you jump in.
Fun Fact: Also being exercised is the Achilles tendon. It’s a thick tendon which connects the gastrocnemius and sloeus muscles to the heel. Calf raises not only stregthens this tendon, but also helps to relieve pain, and reduces stiffness.
Calf Raises: Alternate Techniques
Try this exercise by holding onto or resting your forearms on the back of a chair- or even the foot of your bed. You will notice that the change of positioning may make it feel easier to perform.
- Start out with 10 repetitions, see how that feels. If your calves start cramping, stop. Rest for a minute, stretch them out*, then try again.
- Try resting the balls of your feet on the edge of a step, allowing your heels to dip lower. This provides greater range of motion, which allows you to work more of the calf.
Calf Stretches
After finishing your calf workout, you should stretch those babies so they don’t tighten up and cause cramping. Believe me, one of the last things you want to do is get a charly-horse in your calves. So here you go:
- Stand facing a wall, with your hands placed on the wall at shoulder height and your feet hip-width apart.
- Step back with the leg you want to stretch.
- Keep that leg straight and your heel firmly on the ground.
- Lean forward, bending your front knee while keeping your back leg straight. You should feel a stretch in your calf muscle.
- Hold the stretch for about 20-30 seconds, or until you feel a gentle pull in your calf muscle.
- Repeat the stretch on the other leg.
- Perform multiple repetitions of the stretch, gradually increasing the duration of each stretch as your calf muscles loosen up.
Avoid bouncing or jerking movements during the stretch and remember to stay within your comfort zone. Like with any exercise, stop the stretch if you feel pain.
Note:
- If you don’t like standing in front of a wall, try holding on to the edge of a counter.
- Also, you may have to readjust the placement of your feet to get a good stretch – make adjustments until it feels comfortable.
- Your feet should be facing forward. However, turning the foot a few degrees inward will target the outside of the calf and vise-verse.
It’s important to note that you should always stretch within your comfort zone and avoid bouncing or jerking movements. Stretching should be a gentle, controlled movement. If you experience pain or discomfort, stop the stretch.
So what about, “No Pain, No Gain”?
I’m glad you asked.
Understanding the “No Pain, No Gain” Principle
The point of exercising is to improve and maintain one’s fitness.
Whether one wants to simply maintaining their fitness, or wants to hulk-out and boost their strength, muscle size, and stamina, the “No Pain, No Gain” principle remains the same.
In order for a change to take place in your body, for good or ill, a change has to happen.
To improve fitness, one must exert more stress upon the muscle, beyond the point of what it is accustomed to. Or you’ll get NOTHING.
Let’s say your daily life looks something like this:
- You drive to work (sitting in your car or bus …),
- then, you sit at your desk for 6 or 7 hours,
- then drive or ride home,
- then sit down for dinner,
- then move to the living room (unless you ate in the living room) to sit on the couch and watch television until bedtime – at which point you’d be lying in your bed.
Does this scenario pretty much describe your daily activity? It does for many people, including myself, or at least it did.
In order for your fitness to change for the better, you need to make a change – for the better!
- Take a walk around the block a few times a week.
- Jump up and down 10 or 20 times every other day.
- Get an adjustable desk, so you can stand at your desk.
- Drink water instead of sodas or sweet drinks.
- Drop to the ground and do 5 or 10 sissy pushups before you go to bed.
- Stand on your head in a corner somewhere for 5 minutes. (ok maybe that will only give you a headache…)
These aren’t ground breaking activities, but your body is going to sit up and take notice, if this is new activity.
The pain here is mostly mental. The small amount of energy your body is going to exert won’t be as painful as the pain you’ll suffer in later years, by doing nothing to change your slothful lifestyle.
OK. I admit. That was harsh. I appologize. But I’m preaching to the choir here. Sometimes I need to be slapped to wake up to the harsh realites in my life.
Maybe you are a busy person who can’t fit exercise in their crazy lifestyle. You work 12 hours a day, and your tired as a dog and just want to eat and sleep. I get it.
Tell me. During those 12 hour days, do you ever go to the bathroom? How long does that take, a couple of minutes? Do you think you can slip in 10 or 15 minutes of spare time to do a couple of sets of calf raises, or sissy pushups, or knee bends? Maybe one set of each?
It’s takes minutes!
And the more you focus, and use proper form, the beneficial effects will shoot through the roof! Your body will change, grow stronger, and last longer to adjust to these new minutes long activities. Trust me!
Shifting Gears
The Problem With Pain
I’m writing these articles mostly for people like me, advancing in age and striving for a pain-free life as they proceed down the inevitable downward slide into the inevitable.
But this doesn’t mean that younger people are not susceptible to joint or muscle pain or damage because they certainly are.
Some pain after exercise can be a sign that your work was profitable enough for your body to take notice and adapt to the extra strain you’ve put upon it. Which means strengthening, growing, and fortifying your muscles, bones, joints, and sinews. It’s repairing and preparing itself for the next time it’s subjected to such rigors!
Then there is pain that stays at the same intensity for more than a day, or two days. That’s called an injury! At least that’s what I call it. It means I did too much. It also means that it’s going to take a longer time to heal – to recover. Meaning, no exercising, at least where that muscle is being used.
Importance of Repetitions
Repetitions,or reps, play a vital role in muscle growth and strength development.
But how do we decide how many reps for a particular exercise?
For muscle to grow, get stronger, last longer … you have to stress the muscle to a point beyond what it’s used to. The last 2 or 3 reps should be the most difficult. The previous 7 or 8 reps only serve to bring the muscle close to failure.
Doing so, you are changing the level of what the muscle is used to handling. The exercise is actually breaking down the muscle tissue itself. So your body adapts by repairing the damage, strengthening the muscle, and increasing its size and density. It’s healing and preparing itself for the next time it’s subjected to that level of stress.
- If your goal is to maintain endurance, the number of reps will be higher, with lower resistance.
- If your goal is to gain strength and muscle mass, the number of reps will be lower, and the resistance level higher.
You may have heard of the terms “bodybuilding” or “body sculpting”. By altering the number of reps and resistance levels, you can shape your body like a sculptor crafts a masterpiece or a builder designs a structure.
For me, and possibly for you as well, my goal is strength and endurance: to get up from the floor, to go shopping, walk my dog, go to the park, and maintain a sustained level of energy throughout my day.
Right now, both my thighs and calves are weak. So I will need to strengthen both.
Strengthening Thighs (Quadriceps)
When you have reached the level where you can perform two or three sets of knee-bends for 10 or more reps, it may be time to try deep knee bends, while reducing the reps. Lowering your body past the sticking point, beyond horizontal (refer to Part 1), before returning to a standing position.
I suggest you start off by substituting one of your sets with the deep knee bend. And if you need to hold on to something, that’s fine. Again, like I alluded to in the previous blog, the area where the muscle is being stressed changes through the movement – from start to finish.
(A goofy perception of mine: I think of my leg muscles like my arm muscles, but opposite: My leg biceps is my hamstrings, and my leg triceps are my quads, and my calf is my forearm.)
Now – when you perform a knee bend, from the standing position, the initial stress is where the muscle connects at the knee. As you lower yourself, the stress moves up along the thigh.
When your thighs reach horizontal to the floor (the sticking point) – which I strongly suggest they do not – the central part of your thighs (and your knees) are bearing most of the load.
As you pass the sticking point, the stress continues to your upper thigh. So if you want to exercise your whole thigh, you need to lower yourself from standing, past horizontal, then back to standing. Always use proper form (focus), with smooth, even motion. That’s the goal.
Strengthening Calves
Like your forearms, calves can take a beating before breaking down – relatively speaking. I should say… your calves and forearms can take more of a beating than other muscle groups. So don’t be surprised if you can do 20 or more reps without stopping.
Because they are so tough, you’ll have to work them harder and longer to get results. Here are a couple of ways to do that:
- More reps.
- Tighten and hold your calves at the top of the movement until you feel a burn.
- Place the balls of your feet on a step, or something that raises your foot off the floor. This will allow your heel to drop below level at the start of the motion, working the whole calf.
- Add resistance.
One way to add resistance is to perform a technique Arnold Schwarzenegger made popular back in the day. And it’s fun for the whole family! It’s called Donkey Calf Raises.
- Bend over and rest your forearms on the bed or a table.
- Then have one of your kids or a friend sit on your back as if you were a donkey.
- Then do your calf raises!
Talk about burn!
Incorporating the Two Exercises
Real Quick!
I made mention of how I was going to talk about incorporating knee bends with calf raises at the beginning of this talk, and haven’t mentioned a word of it until now!
All I wanted to say was, as you rise up to a standing position when performing the knee bend, continue past standing, and into to a calf raise.
You’re grouping the two exercises into one movement. I would still perform each separately, but adding the calf raise at the end of your knee bend will prove to be a nice touch – the cherry on the top!!
Summing Up
Okay, I think that was pretty good for today! We learned a few new things, added a few new challenges, which I’ll need to remember to do.
Take it slow and even. Use proper form, or at least strive for it – it will come. Don’t worry too much about doing a lot all at once, but also, don’t slack off, keep it up. Keep up a routine. Make a promise to yourself – 5 minutes every day, 15 minutes every day, when I get up, before I go to bed – whatever. Then stick to it!
Five minutes every other day before bedtime!
10 reps of knee bends between commercials!
Again, I’m preaching to the choir! You and I are in this together!
I’m devoting a lot of time on the legs, people, because they give us so much!
Mobility:
- Walking around the block
- Riding a bike
- Jogging
- Dancing
- Jumping
- Shopping
- Bending
- Standing
Cardiovascular health: doing most of those things, only faster. Strengthening your heart and improving your circulatory system.
What would you do if you lost your legs?
My son did. And it’s more than devastating.
So now you have exercises for your quads and calves.
Always remember to Focus!
Spend those few minutes of exercise, using proper form, so you’re not wasting your time. We’re taking care of our Founding Members. Let’s do it right. Serve them right and they will serve us right, for a long time!
That’s it for this round.
If you enjoy and think this information may be helpful to others, please share it.
If you have questions, drop me a line, and please include the word “blog” in the subject line.
Remember: Please be kind and love the one you’re with!
Ciao until next time!
Roger
