Soleus muscle - the secret of running?

Clearly, running practically is isolating the soleus. Locking one's knees and jumping rope is about the only thing closer I can think of. Maybe some reactive box jumps would do it as well.

Yeah, but what about weightlifting - you know, when you lift heavy, more synapses are recruited and it might improve running economy

tomtom wrote:

Yeah, but what about weightlifting - you know, when you lift heavy, more synapses are recruited and it might improve running economy

Running is about getting things done asap. Weightlifting is about getting something done eventually.

tomtom wrote:

Yeah, but what about weightlifting - you know, when you lift heavy, more synapses are recruited and it might improve running economy

I guess it could help marginally-if anything It'd probably just help prevent injury. Doing heel raises with bent knees would isolate the soleus-obviously this could be weighted.

the soleus muscle is no secret, and not near as important as muscles near the core. it simply stiffens so the core muscles can work their magic.

also, look at the stance times of these subjects. definitely not elite runners.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3979434/table/T1/

tomtom wrote:

In this study we can see that soleus muscle contributes to ~70% of total force generated during running. Yes, more than all other muscles combined:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3979434/

(just look at figure 5 if you don't want to read it all)

So, to run fast with least work involved, we need to isolate soleus and train it exclusively?

Ja but der real question ist, how does one isolate and strenthen dis mascle? Is there an especial mettod to adde strenths to dis modality wissout making de total deployments zat basically resemble running itself and making zis a moot point?

VundaKind wrote:

Ja but der real question ist, how does one isolate and strenthen dis mascle? Is there an especial mettod to adde strenths to dis modality wissout making de total deployments zat basically resemble running itself and making zis a moot point?

I don't want to think about how long it probably took you to write that post

I suggest you look at some Africans and tell me how developed their soleus muscles are. That is if you can even see them, I mean.

Guppy wrote:

I suggest you look at some Africans and tell me how developed their soleus muscles are. That is if you can even see them, I mean.

Guppy wrote:

I suggest you look at some Africans and tell me how developed their soleus muscles are. That is if you can even see them, I mean.

Africans' fiber type is close to 100% slow-twitch muscle fiber. A characteristic of ST muscle fibers is having a small amount of mass. Do not confuse the small size with being weak.

what he said, also - soleus muscle isn't really visible

Reductionist thinking. Try running more to improve running.

tomtom wrote:

what he said, also - soleus muscle isn't really visible

Soleus muscle isn't visible at all, it lies deep to the Gastroc. You could also look and say that glute/hamstring activity wasn't very much, which means the plantarflexors might be over-firing.

Either way, it has been no secret.

Gary Oldman wrote:

tomtom wrote:

Yeah, but what about weightlifting - you know, when you lift heavy, more synapses are recruited and it might improve running economy

Running is about getting things done asap. Weightlifting is about getting something done eventually.

Isn't this precisely the problem with track and field and why it's dying in america? The entire spirit of the sport is about getting something done eventually, delayed gratification, running being CHIEF of those events. Give a newbie 3 weeks to hit a 60lb squat max, or to shave a minute off of their mile time, which one would happen faster?, which one would happen with the best effort/achievement ratio? and which one would benefit the other more?

The soleus muscle is simultaneously not a secret, and not THE secret. Although training it aids injury prevention tremendously, and also helps to build toughness in the achilles tendon which is a huge concern for distance runners and sprinters. As to a direct correlation to the physics of running, training it adds a more dynamic and repeatable elastic response to dorsiflexion. Since most long distance runners do not dorsiflex this has very little consequence other than making to forefoot a more stable impetus for the stride of the runner.

running for runners wrote:

Reductionist thinking. Try running more to improve running.

I take it you've never been injured... Sidelined Seriously enough to be forced to terms with the scientific necessity of biomechanic therapy. ?

Or more likely we have a minor semantic disagreement that is no disagreement at all. Yes running is the means and the goal. and time at the gym is spent to maintain balance, aka the privilege of running.

(what a concept! Working hard to maintain the privilege of working hard. Ah such is life...)

Bon vivant hommes

Lots of bad understanding of anatomy/kinesiology on this thread

1. Soleus does lie deep to the gastroc but, because it is longer than the gastroc is clearly visible inferior to the gastroc.

2. Soleus is better activated when the knee is bent. Gastroc becomes more active as the knee straightens. During the mid support phase of the stride and as the knee begins to straighten, the soleus is the primary muscle active. Only as the knee becomes almost totally straight does the Gastroc take over. Try doing straight leg calf raises vs. bent leg calf raises and feel where the muscles are active during the two exercises.

3. Once you have a soleus injury, it is difficult to recover. The eccentric loading that the soleus takes during the running stride cycle creates tremendous stress on the muscle and old injuries easily re-appear. I would wager that most runners who complain of calf injuries have injured their soleus rather than the gastroc.

seated calf raises would be a very effective way to train this muscle as a means of injury prevention. I doubt seated calf raises will produces drastically faster running times, but they may allow greater volume/intensity of training that would then potentially lead to faster times.

I have chronic soleus injuries. I've got a permanent knot in my right soleus that is about the size of an unshelled almond. It never goes away. If I run to far or too hard, the muscle seizes up around that knot and I'm out of running completely for 1-4 weeks. If someone spends an extra 5 minutes a day training this muscle as a means of injury prevention, I'd say it's time well spent. The problem is that most of us have a limited time span to get our workouts in. Time spent on core/strengthening/stretching/drills/icing.....is time taken away from running. The key is to find the most effective supplementary exercises and use them enough to support rather than supplant your running training.

Why is the calf set higher in Africans vs non Africans?

Thank you, CoachB. You typed out everything I wanted to say but decided not to due to time. This thread is a good example of how poorly understood a lot of things are by people on this site. The soleus is not visible?!?! haha. What? How could anyone who has even the most basic understanding of anatomy say such a thing? If a person even knows what the soleus muscle is they should know it's very visible in non-Africans.

If someone frequently has problems with their achilles, would you recommend seated calf raises? I've only ever done standing calf raises, and while they have helped, I still frequently have problems with my achilles tendons.

The soleus and gastroc both feed into the achilles, so standing calf raises would stress the achilles tendon equally and likely produce the same training effect.

There was a thread a few years back about eccentric calf raises for achilles injury. Help yourself up with your non exercising foot then slowly lower yourself until you reach max dorsiflexion (until your heel has dropped as far as it will go)

If you do this with your knee slightly bent, it will engage the soleus more than if you you do it with a straight leg. Any exercise with the knee slightly bent (or even bent up to 90 degrees) will engage the soleus to a greater extent than the gastroc.

As I was typing my previous post, it occurred to me that injury comes when a muscle is over stressed. So, if you are worried about injuring your soleus and do a bunch of soleus exercise in addition to heavy training, you are more likely to injure your soleus.

My philosophy on cross training/injury prevention is that it should support your normal training. If, in an attempt to strengthen a muscle, you fatigue it so much that it fails, then you are defeating the purpose. With my athletes, we do the majority of our harder strength/stability work early in the training cycle when the running volume is low. As volume ramps up, the strength/stability stuff becomes only supplementary.