Increasing numbers of people, particularly women, are unhappy with the size of their calves and are many are seriously considering calf reduction surgery. However, there are other, less invasive, means than calf reduction to slim down calves. Find out what causes large calves and what you can do to lose weight and slim calves.
TO SLIM DOWN CALVES:
1. Keep your heels down and avoid walking on the ball of your foot.
2. RUN to slim calves and reshape legs.Running is a powerful tool that allows you to slim down your legs and calves. Think about the physique of short- and long-distance runners. Endurance runners usually have thin legs, as opposed to sprinters who have very well developed calves and thigh muscles. Sprinting develops the calves, but endurance running does not and will in fact slim down calves. Run slower, but for longer distances (endurance running). To slim down your legs, slim thighs and calf muscles, do endurance cardio with little to no resistance. That means running on flat terrain when outdoors or keeping the resistance/ incline low on the cardio machines in the gym. This will slim down your legs and slim down your calves, while keeping your legs firm and shapely. Endurance running can reduce the size of the actual calf muscle and reduce the fatty tissue around it (and everywhere else), that is making the calf look bulky. Put simply, it helps you lose fat from calves and it helps reduce muscle mass.
3. Avoid activities that primarily call for strength, power and speed from your legs muscles, as they will create bigger bulkier muscle. For example, short intense cardio workouts, workouts that require strength and exercises that involve resistance, incline or going up hills. Steep inclines on the treadmill particularly and hill running will develop calves and make big calves even larger.
4. Avoid high-impact jumping movements, such as rope jumping. Swimming, walking, cross-training and the elliptical trainer are great to slim down calf muscles. The elliptical trainer is an excellent tool for low-impact cardio. However, keep the resistance on the low. Instead of burning calories by increasing resistance, exercise for longer periods. Walking slims down the lower legs as it lengthens the muscles between the back of the knee and the ankle.
5. Avoid the step machine and other types of climbing exercises, as these type of exercises target the calf muscles to increase size. Remember, your goal is to lose bulky calf muscle, i.e. to slim it down, not make to big calf muscles bigger.
6. Resistance Training. You can either avoid training this area completely or if you prefer use light weights and high reps. Resistance exercises that target the calf muscles will tend to increase the size of the calf muscle – not slim down calves.In other words, resistance training is more likely to give you big calves, than make your calves smaller. Remember there is no such thing as spot reduction. If you need to lose fat around your calf muscles you can only do so through diet, cardio or even liposuction of calves. But you cannot do exercises that will reduce the fat around the calf muscles alone.
7. Stretching makes big muscles appear longer and leaner.Stretching lengthens bulked-up muscles. You could try stretching classes, yoga or Pilates. A great stretching exercise for the calf muscles is a wall push-up. Stand with your front foot approximately one foot from a wall and your back foot about three feet from a wall. Your back leg should be straight, the front leg bent and your hands resting against the wall, while you lean forward. Your feet should be pointing straight ahead and your heels on the ground. Hold for 15 – 30 seconds, switch legs and repeat. You should feel the stretch in the back of your leg. This stretching exercise should help lengthen calves.
8. Pilates is an excellent tool to shape and elongate your calves, legs and body.
9. Ankle circles moves:Sit on a chair, with your back straight and firmly against the back of the chair. Slowly circle your left foot clockwise. Do this six times. Then repeat counter-clockwise six times. Repeat the exercise with the right foot.
10. Find out the causes of big calves:Find out why you have large calves and address the cause.
11. Learn about how to slim down legs.
12. VISUAL IMPACT. Check out Visual Impact for Women (there’s also Visual Impact for Men). If you need to reduce inches – fat or muscle – or feel you are overly muscular it is certainly is worth investigating. The author tackles the issue of wanting to get fit and lean without getting big or bulky head on. The program specifically addresses the problem of being overly muscular and takes it seriously; offering a strategy that encompasses diet, cardiovascular exercise and resistance training aimed at reducing – not gaining – inches. In chapter 1 the author has this to say:
“Sick of hearing that it impossible for you to gain too much muscle because you don’t have enough testosterone? I will discuss that and other myths told to women on a consistent basis.” Visual Impact for Women also has solutions on how to decrease muscle mass, if you feel you are too bulky. Here’s a description from one of the chapters (Chapter 19: How to Lose Muscle Mass on Purpose) of Visual Impact for Women:
“Legions of women have muscular thighs and calves that they would like to make slim and defined. This is common especially with women who have been given poor training advice. Despite this being a taboo subject, I’m going to give you a strategy that works.”
Causes of Big Calves – Fat Vs Muscular Calves
The reasons for large calf muscles (gastrocnemius and soleus muscles) can include the following:
1. GENETIC
If it is genetic (looking at your parents or siblings may help) there isn’t much that you can do to minimize your calf muscles. You can change some variables of your anatomy, but not others. For example, if you have a short Achilles tendon (the tendon that attaches the back of the heel to the calf muscle), your calf muscle will look bigger. Why? Because your calf muscle has to extend lower down your leg to meet the short tendon. However, if you have a long tendon, this tendon reaches further up the leg, allowing the calf muscle to sit high up, making it look smaller and more defined. It is impossible to lengthen your tendons. However, you can focus on ensuring that you avoid movements/ exercises that will make your calf muscles larger.
2. EXERCISE
Repetitive activity involving walking on the balls of your feet (i.e. bearing your weight on the front of the foot), may lead to building-up of the calf muscles. Avoid any activity, which forces heavy use of the balls of your feet (this includes walking in high heels!)
3. GAIN
You could have your gait analyzed, as it may be a possibility that you are overusing your calf muscles when walking. This may be because you are overcompensating for weak surrounding muscles. If the muscle at the front of your lower leg i.e. shins (tibialis anterior, which have the opposite function to calf muscles) is weak/ over-stretched, strengthening them, will help lengthen the calf muscle.
4. FAT TISSUE
Another reason for large calf muscles it that there may simply be a lot of fat in this area, bulking up the calves and making them look big. Everyone has problem spots, even if they are slim. Unfortunately, these problem areas tend to be the last places that fat shifts from when losing weight. This means that you have to be patient, but because it may be the last place that the fat shifts from your body, when you do get slim legs and slim thighs the rest of your body will hopefully be looking great.
A lot of women have large calves. Although a slightly different problem, women such as Misha Barton and Katie Holmes have “cankles” and still look great. Thus, even if you are unable to reduce the size of your calves, remember to focus on the great parts of your body and emphasize those. Depending on the reason for your large calves, if you are unable to slim your calves down, you can stop them getting bigger by avoiding certain exercises/ movements.
source: superskinnyme.com
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