Soleus Exercise: Train Your Calves Like a Pro

Calf Anatomy— What is the Soleus Muscle?

If you don't work in exercise science or study anatomy, you may not know much about the soleus muscle. But soleus exercises are one of the best ways to build better legs.

The calves are an area that many of us don’t contemplate training. If you don’t love working on squat progressions, or leg workout machines, we have bad news: you may be a gasp Leg Day Skipper.

If skipping leg day is a bad habit for you, it’s even less likely that you’re prioritizing calves.

Most people neglect their lower legs when they train, even if they do squats or deadlifts frequently on leg day.

Thinking about the structure and capabilities of your lower legs can help you understand the importance of focusing on soleus exercises.

Let’s take a more in-depth look at your soleus muscles. Learn how to get rid of puny calves to fight weak legs (and looking silly).

All About the Soleus Muscles

When we think about training our legs, it's common to focus On hitting big muscle groups, like the quads, hamstrings, or glutes.

But strength training is just as important for your soleus and gastrocnemius— the muscles of your calf.

What is the soleus muscle? Let’s take a moment to learn more about soleus muscle structure and function. We’ll then unpack why soleus exercise is important for calf growth.

Soleus Structure and Location

This calf muscle sits deep below your gastrocnemius, the other main muscle of your calf. The soleus attaches to the soleal line of the tibia bone in your lower leg.

These muscles both sit below the plantaris in the upper calf.

The soleus unites with your gastrocnemius at the ankle to form your calcaneal tendon, aka the Achilles tendon.

This is one of the most common sites for injury. You can find out more about Achilles tendon ruptures here: Achilles tendon rupture. If you hurt your Achilles tendon, make sure to see a physical therapist, especially if you are someone who is very physically active.

The soleus crosses the ankle joint only, while your gastrocnemius crosses your ankle and your knee.

Soleus Function

Your soleus muscles have two key functions: to help maintain your posture and keep you standing up straight, along with the other muscles of your lower limbs.

And to help with plantarflexion of your foot. This means to point your toes and extend your foot downwards. Both your gastrocnemius and your soleus help with this motion of the foot.

For more information, you can check out: Gastrocnemius and soleus are selectively activated when adding knee extensor activity to plantar flexion.

Solueus Injuries and Strains

Fortunately, calf muscle strains and injuries are less commonly found in your soleus muscles.

The gastrocnemius bears the brunt of the pain here. This is because your gastrocnemius spans a larger area of the leg than the soleus.

It crosses over both the ankle and the knee joints, whereas your soleus only crosses your ankle. For more information on calf strains and injuries, see Gastrocnemius vs. soleus strain: how to differentiate and deal with calf muscle injuries.

Calf muscle strains range all the way from grade 1, where you feel sharp pain at the time and place of injury but can usually continue performing an exercise to grade 3, which result in immediate severe pain and will usually cause you to completely lose muscle function at least temporarily.

Why Don't People Train Calves?

The calves seem to be a very underdeveloped muscle in most people. But in reality, we do get a lot of calf conditioning in form the movements of everyday life. The calves are already well-trained from walking around all day!

Since most people are advised to walk approximately 10,000 steps per day to alleviate the risk of health conditions like cardiovascular issues or cancer, the calves take quite a beating.

You can read more about daily step recommendations in Prospective Associations of Daily Step Counts and Intensity With Cancer and Cardiovascular Disease Incidence and Mortality and All-Cause Mortality.

Since humans evolved to walk on our feet, the calves already have the opportunity to develop to much of their potential through everyday use. In reality, we’re chasing a small potential for strength improvement in the calf muscles.

That being said, it’s certainly possible for anyone to achieve hypertrophy (muscle growth) in their calves with adequate training!

Most people aren’t making the calves and soleus muscles key areas to train. And if you don’t prioritize a muscle group, you’ll have a hard time seeing it grow.

Although there is a genetic component to highly developed calf muscles (like all muscle development), it's a shame to let this muscle group go neglected. Many of us don’t:

• Get an adequate amount of training volume in the soleus and calf muscles
• Make calf training a priority
• Think about isolating the calves separately from the rest of the leg muscles.

As well as any muscles in this part of your leg can and should be trained just like the rest of your muscle groups.

When you're just starting, it's a good idea to add some simple calf raises to the end of your leg day.

Hitting the soleus muscle in this way is a fantastic way to fill out the muscles of your lower legs improve your strength, and build better capacity for moves like running jumping and squats.

Benefits of Soleus Muscle Training.

Since they are a weak area for most people, let’s look at how you can incorporate soleus exercises and calf muscle training into your gym routine or everyday movement patterns.

Take a look at some of the best reasons to train your soleus muscles.

Improves Balance

The soleus muscles let you plantarflex your foot, aka perform the movement you need to balance on your tiptoes.

This helps not only with regular standing balance, but balance on the balls of your feet as well. If you’re involved in sports or activities like dance, gymnastics, or yoga, balance on this part of your foot is an important thing to master.

Better Squat Depth

This has more to do with the gastrocnemius since it plays a major role in the dorsiflexion of your ankle (as we know, the soleus is used for plantar flexion).

But along with techniques like having a spotter for squats, training hack squats and doing squats with resistance bands, having overall stronger calves is a great way to improve your squat form.

No matter what equipment or techniques you use, having the healthiest muscles you can matters!

Many people can easily improve their squat depth and weight by adding a little calf training to the mix.

Although depending on the variation you use, squats are usually quad, glute, and hamstring dominant, the calves can make a major difference in how low you can go in a squat.

Think about it.

Adding calf exercises into your workouts regularly works both of these calf muscles, which can have an overall benefit to the depth of your squats.

Soleus Muscle Exercises

What exercises can you do to strengthen your soleus muscles and grow bigger calves?

Standing Calf Raises

• Set-Up: Stand flat on the floor with your feet hip-width apart. Point your toes straight forward.

• Action: Rise all the way up onto the balls of your feet.

• Muscle Activation: Fully engage your calf muscles as you come to the top.

• Descent: Hold for a moment, then slowly come down to flat feet with control.

• Reps: Repeat this movement for 12-20 reps. Aim to complete at least 3-4 sets.

Pro-Tip: Focus on form. If you find your ankle buckling, rolling, or swaying beneath you as you rise, you may lack strength in either the ankles, the calves or both.

In that case, slow down and focus on making sure the ankles stay straight. If you really struggle to keep your balance, hold on to a wall or machine at the gym until you improve in this exercise.

Use weights if you’d like an added challenge. Adding a light weight, from 8-15 pounds may not feel like a lot but it can seriously increase the burn you feel during this soleus muscle exercise.

Calf Raises on Step

This calf raise variation increases the range of motion. Not only do you get muscular strength work here, but you get a stretch in your calf muscles too!

To do a calf raise with a step:

• Set-Up: Find a step. You can do this movement with the steps at your house, or use an elevated step platform at the gym.

• Body Position: Stand with only the balls of your feet on the step and your heels hanging off. Keep your feet hip-width apart and your toes pointed forward.

• Action: Drop your heels so the balls of your feet are elevated on the step. You should feel a stretch through the back of your leg.

• Elevation: Push up and out of your toes to raise the heels, shortening the calf muscles (like in the above variation) and rise up onto the balls of your feet.

• Reps: Drop your heels all the way down beneath the balls of your feet to complete one rep. Continue this move for 12-20 reps. Aim for 3 sets.

Raised Heel Squats

This squat variation gets your soleus muscles and the other parts of your legs working all at once. For most people, raising the heels on your squat using a weight plate also lets you get deeper into the squat by putting your ankles in a more ideal position for getting low.

Raised heels take some of the strain out of both the ankles and the hips when you squat.

To perform raised heel squats:

• Set-Up: Grab a weighted plate or a squat wedge. Set it up so that the balls of your feet sit on the ground but your heels are elevated.

• Body Position: Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart or slightly wider, depending on your preference.

• Action: Drop your body down into a squat position. Keep your core engaged and your torso upright while you lower your body. You may want to clasp your hands together or keep them on your hips for stability. Push your hips out and back as you squat.

• Reverse: From the bottom of the movement, push up through your heels to drive your body back up to your starting position. Make sure your heels stay planted on your weight plate and don’t start to lift during the movement.

• Reps: If you are using weight, repeat this move for 6-8 heavy reps, or use 10-12 lighter reps for hypertrophy. If you’re new to raised heel squats, try them unweighted until you nail the technique.

Big Takeaway

The soleus muscle is oft forgotten but can make a massive difference in the look and function of your calf muscles.

For those of us (hint: it’s pretty common) who struggle with small or weak calves, trying targeted workouts to hit your soleus muscles is a great way to get bigger legs and and overall more balanced physique.

If you prefer to work out for aesthetics, getting a seamless look from defined quadriceps, to full glutes and a round butt, to limber hamstrings to strong lower legs is the key.

Training your calf muscles and in particular, the soleus is a great way to even out the upper and lower halves of your body too.

The soleus muscle sits below the gastrocnemius muscle in your lower leg. Along with the plantaris, they make up the 3 main muscles of your calf.

Start using moves like

• Standing calf raises
• Step calf raises
• Raised heel squats.

You can be proactive in helping your soleus muscles get stronger and grow. This will help to give the look of bigger calves for a more balanced lower body overall.

Remember to get enough training time under tension and volume and to make calves a focus if you want to see improvement.

Aim to train the calves at least 2-3 times a week. Adding free weights and resistance training to your calf-strengthening moves is one of the best ways to increase the intensity of an exercise and see quicker growth. Make sure to get a full range of motion in all your soleus exercises. It’s also important to train other major muscle groups in your legs, like the hamstrings.

It’s a good idea to track your progress using an app and read blog articles on different muscle groups to attack each muscle that you want to grow with confidence and precision.

References:

Bryan Dixon J. (2009). Gastrocnemius vs. soleus strain: how to differentiate and deal with calf muscle injuries. Current reviews in musculoskeletal medicine, 2(2), 74–77. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12178-009-9045-8

del Pozo Cruz B, Ahmadi MN, Lee I, Stamatakis E. Prospective Associations of Daily Step Counts and Intensity With Cancer and Cardiovascular Disease Incidence and Mortality and All-Cause Mortality. JAMA Intern Med. 2022;182(11):1139–1148. doi:10.1001/jamainternmed.2022.4000

Lenhart, R. L., Francis, C. A., Lenz, A. L., & Thelen, D. G. (2014). Empirical evaluation of gastrocnemius and soleus function during walking. Journal of biomechanics, 47(12), 2969–2974. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbiomech.2014.07.007

Shamrock AG, Dreyer MA, Varacallo M. Achilles Tendon Rupture. [Updated 2023 Aug 17]. In: StatPearls [Internet]. Treasure Island (FL): StatPearls Publishing; 2024 Jan-. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK430844/

Suzuki, T., Chino, K., & Fukashiro, S. (2014). Gastrocnemius and soleus are selectively activated when adding knee extensor activity to plantar flexion. Human movement science, 36, 35–45. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.humov.2014.04.009