Muscles worked
Your calf is made up of two main muscles. The gastrocnemius is the one you can see, and the soleus lies underneath it. The gastrocnemius crosses both the knee and the ankle and works hardest when your legs are straight, so the standing calf raise suits it well. The soleus helps in every calf exercise but takes a bigger share when your knees are bent.
Common mistakes
- Rolling onto the outside of your foot. Under heavy load the pressure drifts towards your little toes. Keep it on the ball of your foot under your big toe and the toes next to it, so your foot moves straight up and down.
- No pause at the top. Hold for a second high on your toes and squeeze your calves before you lower.
- Using so much weight that the movement gets short. With too much on the stack, your heels only move a few centimetres. Go lighter until you can lower fully into the stretch and rise all the way onto your toes on every rep.
Variations and alternatives
- The seated calf raise is done with bent knees and puts more of the work on the soleus, so it complements the standing version.
- The leg press calf raise also keeps your knees straight and suits you when the calf machine is busy.
- The single leg dumbbell calf raise trains one leg at a time and works at home with a step and a dumbbell.
- The calf raise on a step is the option with just your bodyweight and a stair.
Sets and reps
Calves often handle plenty of reps, and a slow tempo makes them work harder. Three to four sets of 10 to 20 reps is a good starting point. Lower your heels over two to three seconds, hold for a second at the bottom without bouncing and for a second at the top. At that pace even 12 reps feel hard. Many people train their calves two or three times a week, which works well as long as you recover between sessions. The guide to sets and reps has more on choosing a range.
Add weight in small steps, and only once you reach the top of the range on every set with the full movement. More weight with shorter reps is not real progress. Log weight and reps in a training log to see that progressive overload really happens with the full movement.