“You can’t read about push ups. You gotta do them.”
The push up would have to be the oldest yet most valid measure of a mans upper body strength and endurance since there has been the concept of physical exercise. It consists of two movements, that being a ‘down’ and an ‘up’, yet offers so many benefits for the poor guy or girl doing them. No fancy equipment or clothes required. You’ve got everything you need already. Your body and gravity.
Of course, there are many variations of a push up. You can just do boring old push ups where your hands are slightly wider than your shoulders underneath your upper body and your feet are slightly apart as you keep your torso and hips in a straight line as you push out the repetitions. The whole time without sagging in the lower back as your core strength starts to fail you on your way to the illusive 100.
Or maybe you want to do the wide push ups where you engage more of your shoulders and chest whilst you have one foot across the heel of the other. Even a narrower positioning of the hands so you bend more at the elbow and engage more of the triceps for that arm pump before going out on a Friday night in a tight T-shirt. Either way, no matter what you’re going for, there is a push up for you. The important thing is that you do them.
How do you improve push ups quickly?
Can’t knock out a respectable 20 without a break? Fine. Do what you can, then drop to your knees and finish the rest. Incorporating a variation that makes it a bit easier isn’t something to be ashamed of. You should also be working your push ups to complete failure as well in order to get better at them. If you’re not, then you’re not really doing push ups are you?
Setting up a simple session of push ups is easy. You can incorporate them as an activity you do in-between rounds of other exercises or have them as a finishing exercise at the end of a run or walk. Just find 10 minutes after a run to do as many push ups as you can do in a minute with 1 minute rest. 5 minutes of push ups with 5 minutes rest. Easy right?
What are the additional benefits of simple push ups?
The humble push up is something that works nearly all of your body. Not only is it engaging your chest and arms, but it’s working your core strength as well by forcing you to tighten and lock together your entire abdominal wall and muscles in your lower back. Don’t believe it? Just hold the push up raised position for 2 minutes by itself and see if you start shaking. If you don’t, you’re either not doing it properly or you don’t need to be reading this.
Setting out a daily routine for a month where you start the day with 50 push ups and end it with another 50 will start you on the path to some serious male self-improvement. Your periods of rest and need to break the 50 up into sets will diminish faster than you think as you adapt. Your body won’t be the only thing to start getting hard either. Your mind will as well and that’s half the battle. Physical pain and healthy suffering will fortify your mind and give you the ability to keep discomfort in context. Remember that when you’re training your body, you’re training your mind to be harder and fitter as well.
The important thing is that you start.
Go!