Full range.....fact or fallacy?

[BlkWS6]

See I always thought that a full stretch in calf training was crucial to development. My logic may be incorrect here, but one would assume that your calves are conditioned to the flat position (parallel) and the up on the toes position due to walking every day (granted we all walk differentely) Therefore, by going through a full range of motion where your heel dips down lower then your toes would expose the calves to a range of motion that they are not familiar with (unless you spend a lot of time in sand or something) which may lead to growth. At any given step that partial range (foot parallel to ground and up on the toes) is supporting ones entire bodyweight, I would assume that specific range of motion would be very difficult to stimulate properly due to an existing high degree of conditioning. Case in point, I see tons of guys in the gym I workout at with rather poor calf development who load on a TON of weight and only perform that partial top range of motion. I would like to hear some more thoughts on this. Im not doubting your progress at all vinyl but I have always believed in a really full range of motion for calves, and I would like to hear more thoughts about this.

 

[vinylgroover]

Casual BB - what you say makes alot of sense.

Blk - I've always thought that too.....i have always emphasised a full range of motion on every exercise.....up until now.

What happened was, i asked this personal trainer at our gym for some calf tips (he is a former bodybuilder). He told me to jump on the standing calf machine and to do some reps. I did that and he immediately pulled me up. He said try this........he pushed my feet closer together (about 3 inches apart) and told me to only bring my heels back to parallel with the platform and then explode back up and get a peak contraction at the top, hold for 1-2 seconds and back down. I swear it's working. I use that on all my calf exercises.

Prior to that i always brought my heels back as far down as they could go, emphasising the full stretch.....for years it did nothing.

Give it a try. Even the first set i did, i really noticed a difference in how my calves 'felt'.

 

[gonelifting]

Casual BB - what you say makes alot of sense.

Blk - I've always thought that too.....i have always emphasised a full range of motion on every exercise.....up until now.

What happened was, i asked this personal trainer at our gym for some calf tips (he is a former bodybuilder). He told me to jump on the standing calf machine and to do some reps. I did that and he immediately pulled me up. He said try this........he pushed my feet closer together (about 3 inches apart) and told me to only bring my heels back to parallel with the platform and then explode back up and get a peak contraction at the top, hold for 1-2 seconds and back down. I swear it's working. I use that on all my calf exercises.

Prior to that i always brought my heels back as far down as they could go, emphasising the full stretch.....for years it did nothing.

Give it a try. Even the first set i did, i really noticed a difference in how my calves 'felt'.

If nothing else changed then I`m confused, but if you added weight to your calf raises then I can see that working. Adding weight will do some "damage". growth.
I would assume that if you shortened the range then you can lift more. correct?

 

[Baoh]

calves have like 3-4 inch rom -

tha extra inch won't make that much of a diffeence, but see those chicken leg dudes that do quarter squats with 405+lbs?.....

amen

Actually, because of that miniscule range of motion, it would mean that each inch was even MORE valuable. Suppose it's a 4-inch ROM and you truncate it to 3 inches. That's a 25% reduction. However, this can be made up for by increasing load.

Vinylgroover needed change, and therein lies the muscular goodness.

 

[vinylgroover]

If nothing else changed then I`m confused, but if you added weight to your calf raises then I can see that working. Adding weight will do some "damage". growth.
I would assume that if you shortened the range then you can lift more. correct?

Nothing else.....same exercises, same rep range, same sets. I could just put it down to simply 'change', but when i was changing exercises, reps, sets etc when i was using a full range nothing was happening..

Yes you can lift more. The thing i notice is i feel a deeper soreness in the belly of the calf than i ever did when i was using a more extended range of motion.

 

[collegiateLifter]

my calves have a hell of a lot more than 4'' of ROM

 

[Markus Riedel]

I have read somewhere in the HST (hypertrophy specific training)forum that the stretch during the eccentric phase is very important in the aspect of tearing muscle fibers apart.

"Mechanical lines of tension" One should never sacrifice ROM for heavier loads. In general excercises that have a great stretch in the bottom position should be favoured. For instance shrugs, incline curls, chins, wide grip chest dips....

 

[Thaibox]

Good thread VG

I don't think I can articulate this very well but I'll try. There's different schools of thought here, each with very sound arguments. I know of very successful and knowledgable lifters who advocate a limited range of motion for many lifts based on a theory of limiting the relaxation property of full stretch or even contraction(I know it doesn't really make sense they way I say it). Also, like it was said, you can use more weight.

On the other hand, there are obviously a great number more people that follow the conventional training theory of full range based upon many well known arguments.

For strength training, and power specific lifts, partials and short range movements are done in an attempt to strengthen a sticking point, so you would think this would translate into muscle stimulation to some degree. There are so many types of muscles in our bodies that are built for so many specific functions, some must benefit by partials based upon their fiber makeup and general function(a good example being calves).

I had a point here but I'm haveing a bad injury day and took a few too many vicodin. I hope someone understands and is able to expand on what I'm trying to say.

 

[Baoh]

my calves have a hell of a lot more than 4'' of ROM

Same here but, in my post, it was for conceded just for the sake of creating a quantified argument.

 

[Jxaxsxe530]

my calves were so tiny its not funny but recently they've been growing like CRAZY! the secret? seated calf raises with my shoes off LOL. People in the gym look at me funny when i take off my shoes and step to the calf machine but i dont care. I get a much longer range of motion with the shoes off and i can lift much more weight. and contraction at the top is much better wid shoes off as well. my friends always made fun of my calves my whole life but last week i pulled my best friend over to the corner and rolled up my pants and the expression on his face made all that effort worth it. and i've only been training shoes-off for 3 weeks =)