Curious if anyone here had additional context around this. Do calf raises have a similar effect? Do people with a habit of bouncing their calves while seated (essentially a soleus pushup as described in the article) have higher metabolisms on average?
It makes sense that a part of a calf muscle could have exceptional endurance, given the importance of walking in humans, but the article seems to say walking doesn't use it enough to activate the same effect. Maybe running?
The article makes some big claims and it would be interesting to see an independent review.
Not sure about the specific differences in glucose utilization between the soleus and the gasctroc (the other main calf muscle) but in general, yes. Calf raises should have a similar effect. The key factor seems to be the soleus doesn't fatigue as quickly, allowing this to be sustained to a point where the muscle energy source shifts to a more long term type of fuel.
As for people who bounce their calves? Absolutely - this is called NEAT (Non Exercise Activity Thermogenesis) in scientific research. Its lumped in with general movement - walking, climbing stairs, etc. This can account for a few hundred calories per day. Here's an overview study that claims up to 350 calories per day: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6058072/
... which works as long as one does not consume more calories that the total amount of calories one burns (i.e. is in a caloric deficit). The real issue is that individuals who suffer from excessive weight tend to be in a caloric surplus
> It wouldn't be much of a metabolism trick at all if it doesn't work in ketosis or fasting. If you can burn fat, it should still work.
Body will always switch to burning mostly fat after a prolonged period of physical activity which studies suggest for moderate level of constant physical activity happens somewhere around 90 minute mark. There are no magic bullets.
I think it's more complicated based on the article:
> "...It’s a very specific movement that right now requires wearable technology and experience to optimize the health benefits.”
So it sounds like the performer may have to look at a graph to see that the right motion has been achieved? This video reinforces the notion: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yaK6TThRMdE
> In brief, while seated with feet flat on the floor and muscles relaxed, the heel rises while the front of the foot stays put. When the heel gets to the top of its range of motion, the foot is passively released to come back down.
Seems pretty simple... I guess what is special is (1) you can do it while sitting, and (2) the muscle doesn't seem to get tired so you can do it all day.
I went looking at the published paper (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S258900422...) and it says on pg3: "this specific type of plantarflexion because
the relatively high soleus electromyography (EMG) on-time (i.e., soleus activation) coincided with upward angular motion of the ankle". The supplementary materials show EMG and range of motion graphs.
A bit of googling says plantar flexion is the same muscle movement needed for pushing the accelerator pedal while driving or ballet dancers standing on their toes.
My guess (not my field of expertise) is the muscle is activated strongly in isolation (the toe pushing down motion) and inducing a large range of motion. So it's not raising the heel so much as pushing the toe down.
“We never dreamed that this muscle has this type of capacity. It's been inside our bodies all along, but no one ever investigated how to use it to optimize our health, until now,” said Hamilton. “When activated correctly, the soleus muscle can raise local oxidative metabolism to high levels for hours, not just minutes, and does so by using a different fuel mixture.”
I'm can't evaluate the claims, but this kind of language makes me suspicious. Is this some whole new phenomenon or are there existing, known effects that this somehow parallels?
There are people who train their entire bodies to function on different biochemical processes, generally long distance endurance athletes training to perform in a fat adapted state for ultramarathons and the like.
The research here just seems to suggest that the soleus muscle itself has a lower "barrier to entry" before utilizing different energy sources (blood glucose and fat oxidation) which allows it to sustain activity for a longer time duration. This makes sense, as the soleus is highly involved in walking, and humans basically evolved to walk more than we've evolved to do anything else.
This is just leg bouncing right? Like sitting in a chair and moving your leg up and down? The thing that people yell at you for because it's annoying and rumbles the table and the car and the chairs?
edit: yes it is. it's shown in the first ten seconds of the video.
“The soleus pushup looks simple from the outside, but sometimes what we see with our naked eye isn't the whole story. It’s a very specific movement that right now requires wearable technology and experience to optimize the health benefits”
As an aside, the web page for this story shows pictures of a study participant seated in front of a big monitor displaying their vitals. I don't know much about study design, but I feel like that would confound results.
> Instead of breaking down glycogen, the soleus can use other types of fuels such as blood glucose and fats. Glycogen is normally the predominant type of carbohydrate that fuels muscular exercise.
> When the SPU was tested, the whole-body effects on blood chemistry included a 52% improvement in the excursion of blood glucose (sugar) and 60% less insulin requirement over three hours after ingesting a glucose drink.
Also not a biologist - just an enthusiastic layman.
The Soleus muscle (Soleal pump) is partially responsible for helping to return blood from your legs back up to your heart while upright. [1] This is a fairly critical process so it would make sense that it would be able to metabolize multiple energy sources.
Interesting. And the logical second conclusion is that this is an evolutionarily costly process, otherwise it would be common across our muscles. Maybe the muscle has a higher risk of injury, degeneration, cancer than othe muscles...?
If anything, the above article says that the soleus can’t utilize multiple energy sources, it relies mostly on the blood stream (which makes sense for better endurance at running/walking).
Also, pumping the blood back is a purely mechanical process, the same is true for your arm muscles, I don’t think it has a relevance here — its a very important process that circulates lymph and helps circulate blood.
All muscles are capable of metabolizing fat. In cycling (and other endurance sports), one of the adaptations observed in top athletes is that their muscles become highly efficient at metabolizing fat during medium-intensity exercise. A professional endurance athlete will metabolize about 70% fat, 30% carbs for the majority of a multi-hour event. This preserves their muscle glycogen for the high-intensity bits where they need to push 400+ watts for 20-30 minutes up a final climb, or do a 1200w sprint to the finish line. When the intensity level exceeds a threshold, the muscle will begin switching to nearly 100% glycogen. Once that glycogen is depleted, muscles lose their top-end peak power output.
Sedentary overweight people tend to become very inefficient at metabolizing fat. At anything higher than a slow walking pace, for example, they will begin the cutover to glycogen and turn down fat metabolism.
I believe the press release is saying that the soleus muscle is unique in that it does not have a readily accessible store of glycogen. So even in sedentary people that are normally extremely inefficient at metabolizing fat, exercising the soleus will force their body to metabolize blood glucose and fat. Normally it takes months or even years of slow and steady exercise to make a sedentary overweight person effectively metabolize fat while exercising at an intensity high enough to trigger serious metabolic improvements. So if true, the soleus muscle would be a magic shortcut to this process.
Yes, fatty acids are bound up in TriAcylGlycerol (TAG). Exercise triggers the breakdown of TAG in fat reserves, sending fatty acids into the blood. These fatty acids go through a pretty complicated process to be delivered into a muscle cell, and then into the muscle cell mitochondria. This transport process cannot keep up with energy expenditure during intense exercise, thus the cutover to stored muscle glycogen (and at even higher peak loads under about 10 seconds, creatine phosphate).
Sedentary people lose the ability to rapidly deliver fat into muscle cell mitochondria.
This is a good summary of the current state of the research.
What is meant by intense exercise? For example, vigorous cardio (age dependent but about hr 150 bpm) is one familiar benchmark, but is this considered intense exercise?
"Sedentary overweight people tend to become very inefficient at metabolizing fat. At anything higher than a slow walking pace, for example, they will begin the cutover to glycogen and turn down fat metabolism."
Hm...very interesting. So is there an ideal protocol for fat mobilization in sedentary people? Asking for a friend.
Yes, muscles can use fat but only when forced to do so bc the primary fuel source is no longer available. This article is showing that even while the muscles and liver have glycogen and glucose is available, the soleus chooses to use fat. This is huge if it’s true!
It has more to do with the ratio of “red” vs “white” muscle fibers. Some muscles trade off some power for endurance and vice versa.
If someone ever tried to train for their biceps they will know how even at the end of the training, the first few repetitions of a set will be “easy”, while afterwards it feels like you can’t move it anymore. It’s because biceps typically operates on its local energy storage, and it is not good at endurance.
Most muscles can use a variety of energy sources. Cells have had to deal with famine and seasons since long before humans, and so needed ways to use whatever energy is available. Sugar is by far the easiest to use for energy, but fats are used as well.
Yes, but the article is pointing out that without being in a state of famine or other known state when muscles have no alternative but to other fuels, the soleus uses other fuels.
So if I activate this tiny muscle in my calf for a while my metabolism will be up for hours? And where all that added energy will go?
I don't know a thing in this area but I know that when something looks too good to be true, it probably isn't.
No I think what they’re saying is if you do this exercise for hours while seated, you will have the increased metabolism and its benefits the whole time without getting tired.
Info is in paper and supplementals, but in short, the protocol was that participants did the spu's for either 130 or 270 minutes each day, with 50 contractions a minute. It's a work out.
Maybe you just have elevated mood and energy levels for a few hours? One of the nasty parts of dieting is that you can cut calories and not lose weight, just have less energy and feel worse. Probably not as relevant if your obese but cutting calories leads to some other effects than weight loss when your already lean.
Conversely if your weight is stable you might be able to add 500 calories with no ill effects, just more energy, faster recovery etc. It would be great if it was just formulaic like your post implies but it isn’t.
> "Hamilton’s research suggests the soleus pushup [...] is more effective than any popular methods currently touted as a solution [to a sedentary lifestyle] including exercise, weight loss and intermittent fasting."
Better than exercise in that most people living a sedentary lifestyle basically get none, and are shit at sticking with exercise regimens.
Better than IF in that IF is a crock of wank.
Better than weight loss in that most people who lose weight gain it back rather quick.
Basically they are saying this is low effort and efficient enough to be better than those options in the realistic scenario of many people being bad at the alternatives
At the end of the video, the researcher says that it's not as simple as just tapping your foot, you need some technology to isolate the motion. Could anyone with a better understanding of anatomy/muscles explain how that works and how they get people to perform this motion?
First, they get the university to publish an article making their claim seem credible.
They then get an investor to give them $300,000 and make a custom order with a factory in China to add another piece of plastic and some branding to an existing device.
They wait 3 months and then receive 30,000 "magic" gizmos in the mail.
Then, they sell people a $250 electric muscle stimulator that you wear while sitting.
Then they buy a really big new house. They live in a city in the United States though so after taxes and paying a few other people off, it barely even qualifies as a mansion.
Fortunately they are almost done with the $59.99 app that tracks how much fat you are supposedly burning while you sit there for hours and your calfs twitch.
I think this will sell very, very well. People are incredibly lazy and want to believe that not only do they not need to get off their fat ass, they don't need to move anything other than their feet and legs a few inches. Not only that, they don't even need the willpower to move on their own, and in fact it only works if they plug in to a device that does everything for them. Lol.
You spent all this time writing a comment calling out this study as a fraud appealing to lazy people, but it seems you were too lazy to read the article and truly understand the device's role...
It looks like fidgeting, but what you can't tell is if the muscle is exerting on the eccentric or what the intensity is. In any case, I'm going back to fidgeting for the afternoon.
This seems very close to the motion of rapid skipping. Once one can skip without jumping like a kangaroo it becomes almost effortless but also gets a good sweat on.
The article & vid makes the specific point that this is NOT like walking or running (although skipping was not mentioned). It seems that they are trying to get the muscle to contract while NOT under load.
A key seems to be that the muscle normally is setup to resist a load and so not change length while activated, and also has an unusually high percentage of cells recruited in each activation vs other muscles (most strong contractions in human muscles recruit like 20% of cells, iirc), so this is to get the full contraction effect and not just a resistance effect. (But I'm just reading into it...)
"It's not as simple as simply doing a heel lift or raising your legs when you're sitting or shaking your leg or fidgeting. It's a very specific movement that's designed where we use some technologies that aren't necessarily available to the public unless you're a scientist and you know how to use it."
This has a bit of a 'smell' that I can't quite put my finger on.
Its not snake oil, its a statement from a scientist who attaches musculoskeletal monitoring equipment to people on a regular basis and knows exactly how capable the average person is at activating specific muscles on command.
Yeah, there's an implied "and if I identify for you the simple way to do this yourself without equipment, my business model goes poof...so I'll just identify two or three things that don't leverage that muscle".
The actual quote from the article - “The soleus pushup looks simple from the outside, but sometimes what we see with our naked eye isn't the whole story. It’s a very specific movement that right now requires wearable technology and experience to optimize the health benefits,” said Hamilton.
This is a statement around how to activate the soleus itself, and its an accurate statement for the majority of the population. It's an odd muscle to target, as we're generally more used to using our gastrocnemius muscles when plantar-flexing our ankle joint. Sitting helps target the soleus (which is why you might find a seated calf-raise machine next to a standing calf-raise machine at the gym) but it still requires a strong mind-muscle connection to activate without having the gastrocnemius take over.
Having some electrodes to measure and display specifically targeted muscle output would help, and this is likely what he's referring to in the article.
But I’m pretty sure you can just touch the lower, outer part of your ankle (where it’s documented in the picture) to find out if you’re flexing the right one. Thinking about pointing my toes helped.
I think people are right the difficulty is oversold.
The trick with the soleus is that its underneath the gastroc. And in many people's musculoskeletal structures, its entirely underneath the gastroc - meaning your trick won't help. Combine that with some compensatory activation of the gastroc during this movement and people won't be able to effectively train themselves to get the full effect of what the researchers are going for here - prolonged duration soleus activation.
I'm not saying they couldn't have done a better job explaining how to do this at home, but its a surprisingly difficult thing to explain to someone face-to-face when you're a personal trainer. Let alone when as a scientist when you only get a short blurb to convey information about your latest research study.
"So, how do you perform a soleus pushup?
In brief, while seated with feet flat on the floor and muscles relaxed, the heel rises while the front of the foot stays put. When the heel gets to the top of its range of motion, the foot is passively released to come back down. The aim is to simultaneously shorten the calf muscle while the soleus is naturally activated by its motor neurons."
I think that gives the reader enough to replicate the Soleus Pushup - perhaps an indication on where the effort/force is to be emphasized/felt would help.
Yes, this press release reads like one of those “I know the secret to weight loss that has been lost since ancient times! Just one payment of $29.99 will get you on the path to your ideal beach body!” But, then I noticed this was from an actual university. Huh. And it doesn’t ask for money. And it basically gives the “secret” in the article. But it definitely has that snake oil smell.
Of course, my friend's Chinese grandmother would admonish my friend for doing this movement at the table - evidently she considered the movement to be an indicator for something that shouldn't be mentioned at the dining table.
I think this is going to end up being an overblow over-editorialized headline.
This looks to be an example of NEAT movements, which engage muscles and therefore of course increases energy requirement. The effect of NEAT on energy requirements of a body is fairly well studies and fairly well known. It would have been far more interesting if it lasted for over 4 hours as that would at least in theory pass the 2nd level signaling.
I agree with all the other comments about this - the whole thing stinks of a BS infomercial, for very specific reasons:
1. Are people supposed to do this contraction indefinitely while sitting? Good luck with that.
2. Is this only supposed to be done with an e-stim machine to generate the contraction? Again, if so, it may be an interesting curiosity, but it's not practical.
FWIW I wouldn't have such a negative reaction if the whole site and presentation wasn't in "slick bullshit" form, but instead conservatively, and clearly, presented their for findings.
It doesn't seem like a stim, rather it's a biofeedback device. The YouTube video shows quite clearly how they are working toward the right 'curve' of muscle tension.
I've been known to pump my leg rapidly like in the video when I'm anxious. Maybe it's an involuntary artifact to "keep the engine running" just in case my flight senses are triggered.
I definitely don't do that tapping motion instinctively. Unless I'm actively doing something, I am naturally still. Ten years ago I found out I have Factor V Leiden, which can cause blood clots. Since then I've consciously tried to develop the habit of toe-tapping.
> In brief, while seated with feet flat on the floor and muscles relaxed, the heel rises while the front of the foot stays put. When the heel gets to the top of its range of motion, the foot is passively released to come back down. The aim is to simultaneously shorten the calf muscle while the soleus is naturally activated by its motor neurons.
Fair enough. I'm guilty of skimming the article, but I saw this: "The soleus pushup looks simple from the outside, but sometimes what we see with our naked eye isn't the whole story. It’s a very specific movement that right now requires wearable technology and experience to optimize the health benefits”, and some statements that made it sound like something requiring specific tech not available to the public.
Thank you, gotta say with that description of the move now it doesn't sound that hard.
from looking at pics of the gastrocnemius muscle (at the back of the lower leg, main portion from the knee, ending about midway down the lower leg, attaches to the achilles tendon) and the soleus muscle (underneath the gastrocnemius, extending from the knee down to the ankle), the gastrocnemius shouldn't activate during the motion.
It seems like you could put your hand on the back of your calf, close to the knee, and ensure that the gastrocnemius doesn't flex/stays loose during the motion.
205 comments
[ 3.8 ms ] story [ 258 ms ] threadIt makes sense that a part of a calf muscle could have exceptional endurance, given the importance of walking in humans, but the article seems to say walking doesn't use it enough to activate the same effect. Maybe running?
The article makes some big claims and it would be interesting to see an independent review.
As for people who bounce their calves? Absolutely - this is called NEAT (Non Exercise Activity Thermogenesis) in scientific research. Its lumped in with general movement - walking, climbing stairs, etc. This can account for a few hundred calories per day. Here's an overview study that claims up to 350 calories per day: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6058072/
Unlikely as untrained person would have a very hard time doing 50 calf raises
I don't think I ever felt anything special after using it.
Body will always switch to burning mostly fat after a prolonged period of physical activity which studies suggest for moderate level of constant physical activity happens somewhere around 90 minute mark. There are no magic bullets.
How would you know this?
> "...It’s a very specific movement that right now requires wearable technology and experience to optimize the health benefits.”
So it sounds like the performer may have to look at a graph to see that the right motion has been achieved? This video reinforces the notion: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yaK6TThRMdE
> In brief, while seated with feet flat on the floor and muscles relaxed, the heel rises while the front of the foot stays put. When the heel gets to the top of its range of motion, the foot is passively released to come back down.
Seems pretty simple... I guess what is special is (1) you can do it while sitting, and (2) the muscle doesn't seem to get tired so you can do it all day.
A bit of googling says plantar flexion is the same muscle movement needed for pushing the accelerator pedal while driving or ballet dancers standing on their toes.
My guess (not my field of expertise) is the muscle is activated strongly in isolation (the toe pushing down motion) and inducing a large range of motion. So it's not raising the heel so much as pushing the toe down.
The research here just seems to suggest that the soleus muscle itself has a lower "barrier to entry" before utilizing different energy sources (blood glucose and fat oxidation) which allows it to sustain activity for a longer time duration. This makes sense, as the soleus is highly involved in walking, and humans basically evolved to walk more than we've evolved to do anything else.
edit: yes it is. it's shown in the first ten seconds of the video.
Cause I could break records if I'm in meetings all week.
But it also is just leg bouncing in that there's no more complicated motion than a certain sort of slow, controlled leg-bounce.
> When the SPU was tested, the whole-body effects on blood chemistry included a 52% improvement in the excursion of blood glucose (sugar) and 60% less insulin requirement over three hours after ingesting a glucose drink.
That's amazing if it is true.
The Soleus muscle (Soleal pump) is partially responsible for helping to return blood from your legs back up to your heart while upright. [1] This is a fairly critical process so it would make sense that it would be able to metabolize multiple energy sources.
[1] https://www.physio-pedia.com/Soleus
Also, pumping the blood back is a purely mechanical process, the same is true for your arm muscles, I don’t think it has a relevance here — its a very important process that circulates lymph and helps circulate blood.
Sedentary overweight people tend to become very inefficient at metabolizing fat. At anything higher than a slow walking pace, for example, they will begin the cutover to glycogen and turn down fat metabolism.
I believe the press release is saying that the soleus muscle is unique in that it does not have a readily accessible store of glycogen. So even in sedentary people that are normally extremely inefficient at metabolizing fat, exercising the soleus will force their body to metabolize blood glucose and fat. Normally it takes months or even years of slow and steady exercise to make a sedentary overweight person effectively metabolize fat while exercising at an intensity high enough to trigger serious metabolic improvements. So if true, the soleus muscle would be a magic shortcut to this process.
Sedentary people lose the ability to rapidly deliver fat into muscle cell mitochondria.
This is a good summary of the current state of the research.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5766985/
Hm...very interesting. So is there an ideal protocol for fat mobilization in sedentary people? Asking for a friend.
If someone ever tried to train for their biceps they will know how even at the end of the training, the first few repetitions of a set will be “easy”, while afterwards it feels like you can’t move it anymore. It’s because biceps typically operates on its local energy storage, and it is not good at endurance.
Is that a typo or are you a very lucky individual?
Conversely if your weight is stable you might be able to add 500 calories with no ill effects, just more energy, faster recovery etc. It would be great if it was just formulaic like your post implies but it isn’t.
Better than exercise? LOL.
Better than IF in that IF is a crock of wank.
Better than weight loss in that most people who lose weight gain it back rather quick.
Basically they are saying this is low effort and efficient enough to be better than those options in the realistic scenario of many people being bad at the alternatives
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
They then get an investor to give them $300,000 and make a custom order with a factory in China to add another piece of plastic and some branding to an existing device.
They wait 3 months and then receive 30,000 "magic" gizmos in the mail.
Then, they sell people a $250 electric muscle stimulator that you wear while sitting.
Then they buy a really big new house. They live in a city in the United States though so after taxes and paying a few other people off, it barely even qualifies as a mansion.
Probably aiming for something like this one https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/6503-Edloe-St-Houston-TX-... which is very nice, but his country club friends who are really rich will compare it to their guest houses.
Fortunately they are almost done with the $59.99 app that tracks how much fat you are supposedly burning while you sit there for hours and your calfs twitch.
I think this will sell very, very well. People are incredibly lazy and want to believe that not only do they not need to get off their fat ass, they don't need to move anything other than their feet and legs a few inches. Not only that, they don't even need the willpower to move on their own, and in fact it only works if they plug in to a device that does everything for them. Lol.
A key seems to be that the muscle normally is setup to resist a load and so not change length while activated, and also has an unusually high percentage of cells recruited in each activation vs other muscles (most strong contractions in human muscles recruit like 20% of cells, iirc), so this is to get the full contraction effect and not just a resistance effect. (But I'm just reading into it...)
This has a bit of a 'smell' that I can't quite put my finger on.
1. Push down with the ball if you foot
2. Lift up with your hip/quad
They look the same, but are completely different. Do either of them activate the Soleus? Do neither of them?
Its not snake oil, its a statement from a scientist who attaches musculoskeletal monitoring equipment to people on a regular basis and knows exactly how capable the average person is at activating specific muscles on command.
"Basically terrible".
It took me a really long time to work out what exactly the fuck "activate your core" meant.
Never mind "activate this muscle you have never thought about before".
This is a statement around how to activate the soleus itself, and its an accurate statement for the majority of the population. It's an odd muscle to target, as we're generally more used to using our gastrocnemius muscles when plantar-flexing our ankle joint. Sitting helps target the soleus (which is why you might find a seated calf-raise machine next to a standing calf-raise machine at the gym) but it still requires a strong mind-muscle connection to activate without having the gastrocnemius take over.
Having some electrodes to measure and display specifically targeted muscle output would help, and this is likely what he's referring to in the article.
But I’m pretty sure you can just touch the lower, outer part of your ankle (where it’s documented in the picture) to find out if you’re flexing the right one. Thinking about pointing my toes helped.
I think people are right the difficulty is oversold.
I'm not saying they couldn't have done a better job explaining how to do this at home, but its a surprisingly difficult thing to explain to someone face-to-face when you're a personal trainer. Let alone when as a scientist when you only get a short blurb to convey information about your latest research study.
Great, sounds patent-able!
Looking up "heel lift", the Soleus Pushup reads/sounds a lot like a seated heel lift. see https://www.livestrong.com/article/137423-heel-lift-exercise...
So maybe not so BS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yaK6TThRMdE&t=6s
Of course, my friend's Chinese grandmother would admonish my friend for doing this movement at the table - evidently she considered the movement to be an indicator for something that shouldn't be mentioned at the dining table.
- what movements was this evolved to support? (sprinting? walking a different way than was studied? running?)
- Are our shoes causing us to underuse this muscle?
Just from the video and the cadence shown I suspect if you did a slightly quick jog running on your forefoot you might hit that muscle on the rebound.
Soleus? More like swoleus!
This looks to be an example of NEAT movements, which engage muscles and therefore of course increases energy requirement. The effect of NEAT on energy requirements of a body is fairly well studies and fairly well known. It would have been far more interesting if it lasted for over 4 hours as that would at least in theory pass the 2nd level signaling.
If you are interested in this, I highly recommend Huberman's podcasts such as https://hubermanlab.com/how-to-lose-fat-with-science-based-t...
and
https://hubermanlab.com/dr-andy-galpin-how-to-build-strength...
1. Are people supposed to do this contraction indefinitely while sitting? Good luck with that.
2. Is this only supposed to be done with an e-stim machine to generate the contraction? Again, if so, it may be an interesting curiosity, but it's not practical.
FWIW I wouldn't have such a negative reaction if the whole site and presentation wasn't in "slick bullshit" form, but instead conservatively, and clearly, presented their for findings.
Any chance they found that it's the same activation you get from walking but just kind of left that part out?
Edit: Never mind, watched the video. Apparently it's the exact reverse of that internally? Did they test a moonwalk?
Seems like a trailer for something that needs to be unlocked with money.
Thank you, gotta say with that description of the move now it doesn't sound that hard.
It seems like you could put your hand on the back of your calf, close to the knee, and ensure that the gastrocnemius doesn't flex/stays loose during the motion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yaK6TThRMdE