Arnold Schwarzenegger Makes a Startling Promise, Says His Favorite Calf Exercise Will “Make a Scene in the Gym if You Try It”

Seven-time Mr. Olympia Arnold Schwarzenegger launched his fitness newsletter on the first day of the new year. The bodybuilding champion then began promoting Arnold’s Pump Club through social media platforms, namely Twitter and Instagram. On Twitter, Schwarzenegger went the extra mile and interacted with fans regularly. However, now that his “village” has more than 300,000 members, Schwarzenegger wants his fitness crusade to reach a million people. In order to do so, the Hollywood action icon has revived his Reddit account.

While he was on a hiatus from Reddit for a long time, Arnie returned to the platform with a Q&A post. And recently, a fan asked the Austrian Oak about his favorite calf exercise. In a startling revelation, Schwarzenegger said the exercise will look hilarious.

A hilarious looking yet effective exercise

The Austrian Oak answered two questions on the latest edition of Arnold’s Pump Club. One of them asked the bodybuilding legend which calf exercise he would recommend. “Hey Arnold, what’s your favorite exercise for calf development? Love Ya!” wrote the Reddit user SkunckyMacNug.

However, the exercise Arnie recommended wasn’t the conventional calf raise, but a hilarious-looking variation. “If you look up donkey raises, you are going to have a laugh. If you have training partners, I promise you’ll make a scene in the gym if you try it,” Arnie wrote in his newsletter.

The reason the Terminator actor said that is because, during a donkey raise, the person has to bend over, raising their hips above head level. The bend maximizes the stretch in the hamstring and calves, which helps drive growth in the muscles.

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The person doing the donkey raise can overload the movement by hanging a weight on their waist. However, if they have a gym partner, their partner can also sit on their back, to provide resistance. The bodybuilding icon also explained why he trained calves every day.

Arnold Schwarzenegger always focused on symmetry

Schwarzenegger gave a simple reason behind training calves every day. “In the old days, I did a ton of volume. I trained calves daily, and my reasoning was you walk every day, so you’re already doing calf raises nonstop every time you take a step,” explained the 75-year-old.

According to the champion bodybuilder, the standard 8-12 reps that work for other muscle groups are ineffective for growing calves. Hence, a person has to do multiple sets of high repetitions with relatively heavy weights to grow the calves.

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What did you make of Arnie’s advice? Have you tried donkey raises? Write your thoughts in the comments.