April 25, 2006
How to perform pushups with an animated image showing the move. Click on the picture to see the full sized animation.
- Lie face down on the floor with your hands (palms down) about shoulder width apart. Your feet should be together with your toes tucked under your feet. Your toes should be the only part of your foot in contact with the floor.
- Look forward, not down. Your body should form a straight line from ankles to waist to shoulders. Your back should be in a natural arch.
- Push your body up by straightening your arms.
- Exhale as you lift your body up. Keep your body straight and do not move your hands or feet along the floor. Do not lock your elbows.
- Pause, then slowly lower your body back towards the floor. Inhale as you do so.
- Keep your body straight. The first thing to touch the ground should be your chin.
Pushups are fairly straightforward. Depending upon how strong you are, you can go down low enough to touch your chest to the floor, or just descend until your chest is about 4 inches from the floor. You can experiment with moving your hands closer together or farther apart.
- How many pushups can you do?
- New animated pushup demo at Okolo.org
- The Hundred Pushups Craze
- How To: Assisted Pushups
- Pushups and Medicine Balls
April 25th, 2006 at 8:20 am
Where is the demonstration of the woosey girl pushups that I do??
April 25th, 2006 at 8:44 am
Funny you should mention that, I took pictures for those. I was going to put them out next week.
May 9th, 2006 at 9:58 am
[...] Pushups are fairly straightforward, but not everybody is strong enough to do them. This modified version of a pushup is much easier and is a great introduction to pushups. Using your knees to do the pushups is called assisted pushups. These types of pushups are also sometimes referred to as bitchups. [...]
June 16th, 2006 at 6:16 am
[...] If you have never done pushups before, or are not particularly comfortable on technique, I have animated instruction guides about Pushups and Assisted Pushups. [...]
June 30th, 2006 at 7:29 am
[...] Along with my own animated version of how to do pushups, you can also see how to do assisted pushups for those that are not yet comfortable doing regular pushups. [...]
September 21st, 2006 at 9:34 pm
[...] I really liked using them. When my hands or my feet were on the floor, I did not have a lot of trouble adjusting to using the medicine balls. It was certainly more difficult than a normal pushup, but nothing insurmountable. Shoulder presses on a bosu ball were much more difficult to get used to. [...]
April 28th, 2007 at 2:49 am
[...] continued my animated workout series with how to do pushups, a staple in just about any routine. I also published a tip about bicycle riding and traffic, [...]
June 10th, 2008 at 8:26 am
I need to work on doing regular pushups again. For now, all I can do is “bitchups” – I like the term too! LOL