Harmeling Physical Therapy Tip of the Month From Tom Faulds MSPT
A great way to help prevent many foot injuries is to keep your calf muscles flexible and stretched out. This is especially important for running athletes where you execute thousands of high impact strides in any given workout.
You have two calf muscles, the soleus and the gastrocnemius. These muscles attach to the back of the heel bone (aka the calcaneous) via the achilles tendon. When you walk or run these muscles contract with great power to propel you forward helping you push off on your toes.
Often when these muscles and the achilles tendon are tight, it can put extra stress on other areas of the foot. This can cause painful injuries such as Plantar Fasciitis and Achilles Tendinitis.
So spend a minute or two twice a day stretching your calf muscles! This is especially important before and after exercise. The common runners stretches most of us know will do the job nicely; below are some pictures.
In the first, Kelly is stretching her back leg; her heel stays flat on the ground and her knee and leg are straight. She gently lunges forward until she feels a stretch in the gastrocnemius muscle in the upper calf of the back leg.
The second stretch starts in the same position but this time Nikita bends her knees and drops her butt straight down toward the floor. Keep that heel flat. You should feel this stretch at the base of the calf or in the second of your two calf muscles, the soleus. Hold these stretches for 20 – 30 seconds and repeat it 2 times each side.
To advance these 2 stretches you can put a small folded towel under the toes to create your own stretch board.
Happy Calf Stretching!
Harmeling Physical Therapy Tip of the Month
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