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I don't understand the physical motion. Simply raising the heel whilst sitting?
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.
> 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. T…
Not a biologist, but I would wonder why only this muscle would be capable of this. Metabolizing fats is a complex process.
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 us…
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/
So just tap your foot in a weird way and you can keep your metabolism high?
> 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. T…
Not a biologist, but I would wonder why only this muscle would be capable of this. Metabolizing fats is a complex process.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not a biologist, but I would wonder why only this muscle would be capable of this. Metabolizing fats is a complex process.
If you do aerobic exercise, you metabolize fat.
“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 lan…
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 has a bit of a 'smell' that I can't quite put my finger on.