All right. Hey guys what’s up?
It’s Stephen Dunn with CORE Therapy and Pilates and I have Rebekah helping me today.
And today, I want to answer a quick question that I got last week from one of my clients and it was about doing a calf stretch.
A stretch of the gastrocnemius and the soleus.
Those are the fancy words for them and basically the calf is what we know them as in common language.
There are two muscles, in particular, the gastroc is the one up top that we can see the most it has two heads on it that are sitting here and underneath it is the soleus.
And then we have the Achilles tendon coming down to the bottom.
What we’re going to do is have Rebekah show a calf stretch, we call this a runner’s stretch. And we’re going to differentiate those two different muscles — the gastroc and the soleus.
We’re going to start off at the wall here doing a runner stretch (so pick a calf).
For her, we’re stretching her right calf. It might be backwards on the video, it might look like her left calf.
What’s happening here we got the back knee straight, the heel is on the ground and what we want to do is lean forward by bending the front knee slightly.
Back knee stays straight, the heel stays on the ground and we’re going to hold this for five deep breaths. I’m going to have you hold it for two for time’s sake but at home, you’re going to hold this for five deep breaths.
Now after those two breaths for her and for limited time. And now I want you to bend this back knee slightly. By bending that knee slightly and doing the same thing leaning forward… we’re now isolating the soleus.
The soleus doesn’t cross the knee joint. So if I’m keeping the knees slightly bent, we get into that muscle.
By keeping the knees straight the calf, the gastroc does cross the knee joint. That’s where we get that stretch going.
And again about five deep breaths, inhaling and exhaling… nice and slow.
That is your calf stretches. Do both sides, five deep breaths.
And that’s what we got for you today guys.
You all have a good one!
Call 512.215.4227 to tell us your story and goals…
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Call 512 215 4227 to learn more about CORE Therapy and Pilates in Austin, Texas.