Progress Your Push-up

The push-up is a common exercise to help challenge things like the chest, anterior delts, triceps, and more.

Next week, we want you to take your push-up to the next level.

But first, we’re starting with an incline push-up. If you can’t complete a pushup from the ground, grab a bench. The incline push-up still targets the chest muscles but reduces the body weight you are lifting and is more effective than the modified version from your knees. 

Working to do reps with proper form on the bench trains your body in the same position as a pushup from the floor, so you will be able to increase your strength in no time!

Incline Push-up

Basic Push-up

Leslie demonstrates the basic push-up below. In terms of form, these are the things she looks for in order to get that perfect push.

-Hands are slightly wider than shoulder width apart and directly below the shoulders

-Shoulders are down and back (no winging or shrugging!)

-Body is in one straight line (no downward dog, make sure you squeeze through the glutes!)

-Head is looking down (keeping spine in neutral)

-Keeping your arms at a 45 degree angle as opposed to a 90 degree angle can help

 with shoulder issues.

What We Don’t Like With Push-ups

In the left picture, Leslie demonstrates a push-up, where her hips are too high. Try lowering your upper and lower body at the same time to prevent improper form.

On the right, Leslie’s hips start to drop creating an excessive arch in the low back. Make sure you squeeze your glutes and keep your core engaged throughout the entire exercise. This will ensure you keep a neutral spine providing a stronger push-up form

Decline

The decline push-up is a great first step to progress your basic push-up. By placing your feet higher than your hands, it increases the difficulty. As well, adjusting the height of the bench, allows you to control how difficult you wish to make it. Watch out for arching in the lower back, only progress when you can maintain a neutral spine throughout this entire movement!

Plyometric

The plyometric push-up is very advanced and requires great amounts of strength.We happened to catch Leslie mid push!

Make sure you’re well warmed up before attempting this exercise; starting with a few regular push-ups is always a great idea.

Begin this exercise by lowering into your push-up and exploding away from the floor. The key to this exercise is to be able to control yourself as you lower back down to the floor before pushing off again.

Additionally, you can always try traveling push-ups. After completing a push-up,  move laterally with the same arm and same leg before completing the next rep. This creates a fun challenge and can also be applied moving forward and backwards.

Have more questions about your push-up? Feel free to ask one of our trainers! Or hit up a fitness class; classes like boot camp and HIIT FIT include these bad boys. 

Now getting pushing!