The calf muscle is actually made up of two different muscles; the gastrocnemius and the soleus.
I like to think of these two as the Tortoise and the Hare.
The gastrocnemius is the big, strong, powerful, flashy muscle of the calf. When you squeeze your calf, you’re squeezing this guy – it’s the muscle that grabs all of the headlines, and the one that most of us picture when we think of the calf. And then there’s the soleus…
The soleus isn’t as big as the gastrocnemius, and lies deeper underneath it’s flashier sibling, away from the limelight. However, this muscle excels in an area that the gastrocnemius struggles with – stamina. The soleus is the one keeping you ticking over as you hit mile 7, 8, 9, and so on, and so forth.
So we’ve got the strength and power of the gastrocnemius (the hare) and the steady stamina of the soleus (the tortoise), except in this situation, they’re not racing against each other – they’re working together, as a team (to benefit YOU!) As a runner, they should both be equally as high up on your Christmas list as each other – they keep you going! As a thank you, when you’re stretching, you may stretch the gastrocnemius, but the soleus is often forgotten about. Ignoring the soleus when stretching can lead to tightness in the muscle, and pain in the calf and/or Achilles tendon – so he needs some TLC too!
Here we’ve got a stretch for the gastrocnemius – simple, easy to do, I’m sure you’ve seen or done this stretch before.
Here is a slight moderation of the previous stretch, and by bending your back leg slightly, it focuses the stretch on to the soleus, rather than the gastrocnemius. Give it a go, you should feel difference between the two stretches yourself. The key to both of these stretches is keeping your heel on the ground, and just gently leaning forward until you feel the stretch, and then hold (20 seconds on each leg). Most calf stretches can be modified to target the soleus by bending the knee, for example calf stretching on a step should also be done with knees straight AND knees bent.
It’s time that we all started to appreciate the tortoise a bit more as (…whisper it…) he does all right in the end doesn’t he?!