Since my fall back in January or February, I’ve basically completely stopped doing push ups. Then again, back then I was doing push ups, sit ups, and DDR as my daily workout. After my fall, I would try to do a push up every other day and wasn’t able to last even one, which was what actually prompted me to go see the doctor and hand specialist which told me I damaged my tendon. Anyway, I’m not sure what fixed it, either the exercises I was told told to do, the splint which kept my thumb from moving, or the special Chinese ointment my mom help rub on my hand for a few days, the pain eventually disappear.
Anyway, during our rafting trip last week, I noticed how much weaker my upper body was. It could be the fact that everyone’s upper body gets really sore from rafting, but I felt it was weaker than normal. I mean that could be case given the fact my exercise bike doesn’t really exercise my upper body, so I decided to put push ups back into my daily workout. Boy was I weak. After only 40 push ups, my arms were literally shaking. I remember doing that with ease just 6 months ago. I felt the pain in my triceps pretty much immediately, which is a good sign I guess that I’m actually working them out. My triceps remained sore throughout the next day too (shows you how weak I’ve gotten) and I almost wasn’t able to do push ups the following day.
What this is going to lead into is how to properly do push ups. You’ve seen people bend their knees and back and I’ve even seen someone that looked like they were humping the floor. We would always laugh during P.E. But what I’m referring to is the arm distance and the legs and so on. I mean some people put their arms really far apart, while others put their hands together and form a triangle with their thumbs and pointer finger. Then there’s the proper leg formation. Are the suppose to be together or separate and how far apart?
I’ve always done the hands at elbow length apart and the feet together and lowering myself till I hit a right angle with my elbows, but I think I might actually be doing it incorrectly and might end up hurting myself. And push ups definitely put a lot of stress and pressure on my wrist and I don’t want to end up damaging it again.
A search revealed a couple sites telling you how to do a proper push up:
- Wikipedia – Press up
- essortment – How to do a proper push up
- wikiHow – How to Do a Push Up
- eHow – How to Do a Proper Push-Up
- Different kinds of Push Up
- 19 Push Ups Variations Without Any Equipment
The last 2 links were interesting as it revealed to me that the push up variation I was doing is called the wide push ups where your hands are 4 feet apart, however the consensus for most is that your hands are shoulder width or a little more apart and feet together. Lower your body until your chest touches the floor. I always wonder how people can make their chest touch the floor, but it makes sense since my arms are farther apart, it becomes difficult to make an acute angle with my elbows to lower my body even further. If my hands were say closer together, an acute angle is very possible. With the many different variations of push ups displayed in the last 2 links, I’m not actually quite sure which ones are safe to do. There were quite a few I think can easily hurt yourself with.
Anyway, another variation of push ups I do, but I can only do about 5 before I have to give up, is the knuckle push up. A knuckle push up is where you form fists with your hands and push yourself up with fists instead of your hands being flat. It actually requires a lot more strength than a regular flat palm push up and is quite a workout. I used to end my push up workouts with 1 knuckle push up.
One thing that I see very common is that some people do push ups with the legs spread apart. There’s many pictures showing this, but the instructions do say to keep the feet together or parallel. I then found this link: Air Force Technical School Physical Fitness Requirements which says legs should be together or upto 12″ apart. I’m guessing if your feet are apart, it gives better balance and makes it a bit easier. One of the videos above had the guy do a 1 hand push up, and that was the only push up that he had his legs spread apart in.