Calves discussion

[Love_to_Bodybuild]

Holy cows!

I've been noticing from my thirteen years of bodybuilding that if a guy is smaller (and this is my own observation, didn't read or find this somewhere else, even if it has been noticed before) and has a great set of calves he looks much bigger and most likely wins shows whether its unconcious or not , due to judging him stands out so much more.

example imagine Ed Nunn having a pair a thick cows. If he did wow

now lets take Dorian, imagine he had some 17 inchers. Hed look like a different person entirely

While Ronnie had so much size and calves were so-so I guess-my point is Dorian was smaller , yes, (more conditioned as well overall) --my point is even if a guy is a lil smaller, the calves make him look much more impressive.

 

[Love_to_Bodybuild]

latest my calves measure wer 17.5 in 2008 when I tried the calve cardio incline treadmill thing Dante recommended. Now im bigger upper body and such and on a measuring tape they have not surpassed 17.5's

something I got out of Chris Cormier is deep tissue massaging hard the calves makes them grow, his calves were really high but he seemed to do a goodjob with them, with what he had

**broken link removed**

for the snythol and implants, no thanks, thats not bodybuilding

 

[cannibal]

Calves are my enemy, when i started training all i trained was legs for six months. Was training for kick boxing & wanted to be able to break legs.
The gym i trained at had a pic of Tom Platz above the squat rack, and after a while i gave up fight training and wanted legs like Tom
About that time one of my mother's big mouthed fat assed friends mocked my chicken legs one afternoon, and from that day forward was determined to build the calves no matter what.At the time my gf father who never trained at all had mad diamond calves without ever training them, which made me even more determined.
14 years later im finally able to wear shorts.
Cycling 45-60 mins daily, focusing on flexing them every revolution, feels weird at first, but eventually comes ok, lots of single leg bodyweight calf raise, empathising stretch and contraction, and 100 rep sets.
They'll grow if you want them to, but set aside a decade or so, not months or years!

Before

14 years after.

 

[doug1]

High calves is the curse for black guys, but their arms are usually huge!
I use to work with a big ass black guy, He had a gut, probably 15% bf, but his arms were huge ripped and vascular. He use to get free refills on SHAKES at McDonalds. Lol, the cashier was scared he was gonna reach across the counter and lift them up by their neck!

damn cannibal! Nice job!! Yeah, I use to think heavy weight was key to calves, I have changed my opinion on that. Much is about pain tolerance and lots of blood flow...

 

[cannibal]

Definitely, going heavy didn't do much at all in the way of growth for me either.
I had the misfortune of reading Mentzers stuff early on, and blindly followed it for years, ignoring the lack of growth.
High frequency, quality reps and volume is the key IMO

 

[doug1]

I remember many years ago, picking up a muscle rag off the shelf at a walmart, Dorian was in his prime. The cover had a shot of his calves, I just remembering "holy shit!" Chris Dickerson had some calves, but Dorian, damn. Everyone talks about his back, and rightfully so. But his calves!
Dorian's views on squats, probably freed up the squat rack a little for a few years...other than the folks who did curls there(but there wasn't many free bars around at my cheesy anytime fitness). And the fitness gurls doing 95pound squats sticking their butts out, trying to get a date that night....

 

[doug1]

 

[doug1]

 

[InfiniteMuscle]

Calves will grow if you continue to work them from every angle and vary your technique. However, it competitive bodybuilding it seems that calves are rarely even looked at.. Luckily I have some decent calves (not overpowering but still proportioned) but to me, huge calves look badass!

 

[Love_to_Bodybuild]

Calves are my enemy, when i started training all i trained was legs for six months. Was training for kick boxing & wanted to be able to break legs.
The gym i trained at had a pic of Tom Platz above the squat rack, and after a while i gave up fight training and wanted legs like Tom
About that time one of my mother's big mouthed fat assed friends mocked my chicken legs one afternoon, and from that day forward was determined to build the calves no matter what.At the time my gf father who never trained at all had mad diamond calves without ever training them, which made me even more determined.
14 years later im finally able to wear shorts.
Cycling 45-60 mins daily, focusing on flexing them every revolution, feels weird at first, but eventually comes ok, lots of single leg bodyweight calf raise, empathising stretch and contraction, and 100 rep sets.
They'll grow if you want them to, but set aside a decade or so, not months or years!

Before

14 years after.

do you know before and after size on the tape measure?

how many times a week for calves ?

i just figured since i work most bodyparts once a week, callves at most two times a week, and usually once. I go u to 700-800 lbs on standing calves and have for years now and could start trying the 100 rep thing with full rom

 

[cannibal]

Ive never taped them, gave up measuring a few years after starting training as nothing changed much and was depressing!

I don't go heavy at all, normally high reps. All heavy got me is strong, with no size. I'd estimate 80% of the change came in the last six years by doing similar to below

Sample day
Calf press on Leg Press, weight I can do 30-40reps with, rest 10 secs and repeat until hit 100 reps total.
Seated Calf, similar, but hit 150 reps.
Single leg bodyweight calf raise, emphasising stretch and pushing right up onto big toe, 10-12 reps a side, no rest, alternating for 6-8 sets.
Immediatly after training them walk for 30-45 mins to get some real high rep work in. There is 30kg bodyweight difference between the before and after pics, and think while higher bodyweight helps improve them through carrying you, you gotta actually do some carrying, so walking when fatigued should help.
I do it 3, maybe 4x a week, plus 45mins cycling flexing the calves on every down stroke.

 

[jm425]

I'm a shorter guy and this is my calf. I honestly think it comes down to genetics. I've always had big calves even when I was a child. They grow easy too. I'm only 168 pounds, but lean and my calves dominate my lower body. I have tiny quads and hammies though.

 

[brutus69]

i think calves genetic more than any other bodypart.
i know guys with calves like diamond shaped softballs, even women with calves like that. the directv guy here yesterday had calves that were bigger than any bodybuilder ive seen at the gym and he dont work out at all.
im obsessed like that, i notice calves everywhere all day long cuz mine are tiny.

 

[chrisrome]

I agree completely, Weird thing I noticed is the fastest guys in the world have skinny calves. seems ironic i guess.

 

[1fst400]

Finally got my skinny ass calves to grow after years of stubbornness. 2x a week and 2 exercises. On leg day they go first. I don't care about weight but I keep reps 12-20 with deep stretch and good contraction. I don't bounce. I'll have to try higher reps like some of you mentioned.

 

[spartan995]

i think calves genetic more than any other bodypart.
i know guys with calves like diamond shaped softballs, even women with calves like that. the directv guy here yesterday had calves that were bigger than any bodybuilder ive seen at the gym and he dont work out at all.
im obsessed like that, i notice calves everywhere all day long cuz mine are tiny.

lol bro, i'll even point out guys to my wife .."babe, look at his calves, damn!!" One day I will get a good set of them lol

 

[Warhammer1]

I found this to be interesting...my apologies for not understanding how to load the images

The Best Exercises for the Calves
by
Tom McCullough MEd.

**broken link removed**

**broken link removed**

While most people in the gyms don’t bother training legs and instead look like the rode in on a chicken, training calves seems to be limited even further. So what did our researchers say is the best exercise for those of us who do train our calves?

Figure 8: Relative EMG activity of the calf muscles during selected exercises in comparison to the standing calf raises data adapted from Boeckh-Behrens & Buskies. 2000


As noted, the donkey cal raise with a 90 degree bend in the knee seem to be the most effective. Researchers noted that all of these calf exercises can be made more effective by incorporating peak contractions and forced contractions in the stretched position. Moreover, it is imperative that you do not actively bend the knees during the seated calf raise (no bouncing!), if you do not want to reduce the muscle activity by -11%. In a similar vein, you also do not want to mess with foot position, because the parallel foot position is the one that activates the inner, as well as the outer part of the m. gastrocnemius maximally. What a shock, huh?

Figure 9: Relative EMG activity of the m. gastrocnemius with different foot positions data adapted from Boeckh-Behrens & Buskies. 2000

That being said, the researchers thought it is worth mentioning that the overall activation of the calves is maximized during standing and bent-over (donkey) calf raises, while the m. soleus activity is highest when you do seated calf raises. A rule of thumb with regards to the activation of m. gastrocnemius vs. m. soleus is "maximize knee angle (as in standing calf raises or donkey calf raises) to maximize gastrocnemius, minimize knee angle (as in seated calf raises) to maximize soleus activity"

Arnold Schwarzenegger and Dave Draper
"Real men" ain't ashamed of doing donkey

 

[johnjuanb1]

Calves are my enemy, when i started training all i trained was legs for six months. Was training for kick boxing & wanted to be able to break legs.
The gym i trained at had a pic of Tom Platz above the squat rack, and after a while i gave up fight training and wanted legs like Tom
About that time one of my mother's big mouthed fat assed friends mocked my chicken legs one afternoon, and from that day forward was determined to build the calves no matter what.At the time my gf father who never trained at all had mad diamond calves without ever training them, which made me even more determined.
14 years later im finally able to wear shorts.
Cycling 45-60 mins daily, focusing on flexing them every revolution, feels weird at first, but eventually comes ok, lots of single leg bodyweight calf raise, empathising stretch and contraction, and 100 rep sets.
They'll grow if you want them to, but set aside a decade or so, not months or years!

Before

14 years after.

Good Lord that's a big calve!!!

 

[Bio]

I don't think anyone can go wrong doing the DC style calf routine!

 

[alfresco]

“The first Black to win the Mr. America contest, Chris Dickerson,
in 1970, was a man who was noted for having unusually good
calf muscles, but he told me that his twin brother, who had never
trained, had even better calf muscles; I met his brother a few
years later, and his calf muscles were better than his brother’s.”

I recall this story that Arthur Jones tells about former Mr. Olympia
Chris Dickerson. Chris was most noted for his outstanding calf
development. Arthur made the point that Mr. Dickerson was
one of two surviving triplets and that the brother that had
never trained actually had calves that were larger than Chris'
calves. Recall that maternal twins (or triplets) are actually, in
genetic terms . . . clones. This suggests that all the dedicated
training Chris did for his calves only served to make them
smaller.

Moral of the story is . . . be careful when training, especially
for some reason your calves as more is not always better.
And sometimes doing nothing, letting them go along for the
ride as other body parts grow (think forearms) might in fact
be the best solution. You either have them or you don’t, sorry
to say.

I can think of no other body part as peculiar as the calf muscle,
which in my opinion being resistant, if not the most resistant to
significant growth. While some gains in all body parts are possible,
calves in particular seem the most stubborn. That is why SEO and
‘implants’ are not unusual and then again, some Mr. Olympia
contenders clearly resist this solution (their calves have gotten
smaller over the years . . . what other body part could survive
this conundrum?) regardless of what they do, cannot bring their
calves up to match, be in in proportion to their other body parts
. . . try as they may.

I have seen some of the most amazing calves (mostly women?)
on people that have never touched a weight in their life, let alone
trained with weights, let alone trained their calf muscles. I am
sure we have all observed them . . . no upper body, no real muscular
development in any body part but they have world class calves. It
is just bizarre. No other muscle group can match this distinction in
my opinion.