After doing some, I got thinking about all the different ways to do a standard push up. So how do you do a standard push up, and how many of them can you do? I do them on my knuckles with elbows tucked in to isolate the triceps, head facing forward. Full rom is a fairly speedy dip so the chin/nose is just off floor, and then slower up. I can do about 20 What I consider to be the standard standard is elbows facing out, of which I've done round 70 max.
I also do them on the knuckles, I do them very very slowly so it becomes almost like an isometric excercise, or similar.
Well I do them in different ways each time I do them in the set that I do with body weighted training. I try to hit the different muscles in a workout. I never take my elbows beyond my shoulder blade when doing chest/arms not that that is bad but at that point I am focusing on a different area than the shoulder/arm at that point. Like in hand stand I am working on the shoulder/lat/arm areas. Try to find what area each on of the different pushups work than you can make a more informed decision. Like slightly out elbow work the mid-back muscle around the spin. Get cheap but descriptive anatomies for the muscles book. Good sight to check out is the http://www.bodyweight.com forum.
If your looking for strength training, pushups aren't your best answer. They can develope muscle endurance but that's about it. If you really want to do push ups and build strength, you need more weight and less reps. So push ups are mostly good for doing more push ups. But a lot of them can impress people easily.
I do push ups as a form of mild aerobic activity. I tend to do steady sets of sixty at an angle (the easier upwards facing) when I'm working at the computer - just to give me a break from looking at the screen. Sometimes I'll do 4 sets in a day, sometimes I'll do eight sets in a day.
Don't do old 'military' style push ups anymore (vanilla straight up and down), due to tendinitis in my elbows. Also, doesn't really add any martial benefit I can see. Have gone to judo, or what Furrey calls 'Hindu', push ups. First learned these in hapkido 15 years ago but didn't continue 'em. Recently restarted and am up to about 25, on the way to 50+ I hope. One advantage is they seem to work shoulders and back very well, as well as (supposedly) stretching at the same time.
I used to do a lot of triangle pushups, the ones where your thumbs and forefingers for each hand touch together. Way harder than your standard up/down pushup. I've always had trouble with push ups since I have long arms, so I have to cover more distance per push up than the average person. Not exactly a good thing for military physical fitness tests in the past.
This kind of thing. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuEyqnI2OpI"]Explosive Upper Body Warm Up - YouTube[/ame]
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X72LtRcXR6g"]Exercise video: SGT Ken's "Push-up Improvement Plan #01" - YouTube[/ame] This is a good video for improving pushups.
hmmm, different types of push ups that i've done... standard ones with elbows in or out. push up then clap your hands together, once or twice. push up then clap your hands together behind your back (i can only do these from extended box position at the mo...) push ups on the back of the wrists with fingers pointing in, out, forward or back standard push up and when you come up turn your hands over and land on the wrists and vice versa. finger push ups taking a finger away each time. "spiderman" push ups, go down and bring one knee to the elbow keeping the foot off the floor, changing sides each time "cross over" push ups, go down and bring one leg across, underneath the other leg keeping it straight and off the floor. push ups with someone holding your feet off the floor, waist height & shoulder height. handstand push ups (i find these the hardest at the mo). i tend to think of push ups as an aerobic excercise. as far as i'm concerned doing loads of push ups will only make me better at doing push ups so i don't think about how many i can do in one go, but i can manage anything between 5 & 50 depending on which ones i'm doing.
I take weight plates and put them on my back then do standard pushups with elbows in and go down till my chest touches the ground... i put 10lbs on my lower back, and 25 on my upper back.. and do sets of 15
You sound pretty dismissive of pushups. That's sad. They've been part of many types of training routines just about forever. For good reason. All the strength in the world isn't going to be of any use if you haven't got endurance. Any boxer knows that. Pushups are a great workout for the core as well chest and shoulders and to a lesser extent the back. They're not a monster strength building exercise. They're not meant to be. But you're sadly mistaken if you think pushups in all their variations only contribute to doing more pushups. I'd say you must not follow combat sports and their training regimen at all if that's your take.
I agree slip, it sounds like that he does not use added body weights to the idea. Gymnastic that is what they do, they add a vest to the body that is around 150 lbs. they add weight to there feet via a band, one person I knew that did the rings could work the ring with some where near 200lbs added to his own weight. You can develop size and cut to the muscles via the push-up. While free weights should still be a part of your body health and workout it should not be all you do.
IMO the only requirements for a standard pushup are body rigidity and straightness, as well as use of FULL range of motion. This means that you always touch your chest to the ground (hips should touch at the same time), or head to ground when you are doing handstand pushups and so forth. Most people dramatically shorten the range of motion, and consequently have a dramatically different idea of what a 'standard' pushup is. Though, I've no problem with people modifying this to suit their needs - ie shortening the range of motion or allowing "kipping" with the hips to make the movement suit a conditioning-oriented circuit better or something of that nature. A pushup can be an excellent strength developer. How many people do you know who can perform a real full range of motion, non-cheating one-armed pushup? Or handstand pushups while increasing the range of motion via chairs or parallel bars? Though PlasmaShock was probably aware of this, and was referring only to normal shoulder width grip pushups (of which most people can do at least 15 or so), as he did mention the possibility of weighting them etc.
Alright now what do you mean as Full Range Of Motion(FROM)? Please explain, Freyr! If you are going from a loaded muscle that is ROM (Range of Motion). Is that what you are suggesting to be the way of doing the push-up.
According to your definition of a 'standard pushup' more than half the population will be unable to achieve this even with a high level of physical conditioning.
I explained in the first post, sorry if it wasn't too clear. "This means that you always touch your chest to the ground (hips should touch at the same time)" Basically just go all the way down to the ground (not necessarily loading yourself on the ground) and come back up. righty - not sure if you were talking to me or not, but if you were that's really not true at all. The load will vary between 2/3 and 3/4 of your bodyweight depending on both individual anatomical differences and where you are in the ROM (the angle of your body relative to the ground will alter the distribution of the load). With a 'high' degree of physical conditioning pressing this weight should be no challenge at all, and I would venture to say most people can perform at least one.
Yes, I was talking to you. And what I said is indeed true. My gripe it with your definition which you have used more than once now. I'll even make it easy for you and point out the part I do not agree with... "This means that you always touch your chest to the ground (hips should touch at the same time)" Now combine this with my initial response of... "more than half the population will be unable to achieve this even with a high level of physical conditioning" Now think on it for a little longer and then get back to me. The clues are all there for you to see.
