For the past two weeks, I have been able to keep up with my daily pushup goals, even though I haven't been able to increase my first set. Three days ago, the wall hit me. I've done my part, stayed on schedule, but reached my limit. I maxed out the 5 sets of pushups I was doing and had to start in a 6th set. Now, that's not that big of a deal you say. Perhaps not - but will I do an increasing number sets to keep up with my pushup goals and perhaps require 35 sets of pushups in order to 1000? I say, no!
In trying to figure it out, I have sat down and analyzed my numbers (good thing I've been keeping a log)! My first set has not changed for about 2 weeks - 34 pushups. However, I have been able to slowly increase the remainder of the sets slowly. I was trying to determine why I couldn't get my 1st set numbers up, and I came up with 2 possibilities - a mental block or a physical block.
Mental block: I started working on the possible mental block by imagining myself doing 50 pushups continuously using good form and without feeling tired. Well...that didn't really work. I moved on to the possible physical block.
Physical block: doing my first set, I noticed that I had to stop because my arms were getting so tired they were going numb. In fact, after I let my arms recover, I was still able to do more pushups. I felt that maybe it wasn't my chest musculature that was the limiting factor, but perhaps my arm musculature. My father-in-law suggested I could use weights to increase arm strength and that might help.
Eureka!
I need to start adding dedicated arm exercises! This guy has come up with a push up schedule that incorporates arm exercises: 100 push ups.
So this has become the new plan - I haven't however decided whether to do this au-naturelle (check out "Diesel Pushups" in the links) or actually get some weights. I also haven't figured out how I will incorporate these new exercises with my pushups.
hmmmm......
5/29/2007
The Wall hit me
5/22/2007
Experimenting - inadvertently
I, without meaning, took the weekend off without doing pushups - that's 2 days off as compared to my usual one day off. I thought it would be a good experiment to see if I did better with my numbers after a long break period. I have been told repeatedly that muscles need to recuperate for maximum benefit.
What I found on Monday was that I was able to do LESS pushups in my first set. It's a little bit counterintuitive. Less strength with more rest?
My theory is that pushups, unlike working with weights, don't increase your muscle mass rapidly. So the tear down/rebuild process is much more mild. That being said, I thought that it might be more advantageous where pushups are concerned to not take a break at all, not even one day!
So my new regimen will be as follows:
day 1 - 3 -> pushups according to the schedule
day 4 -> 1/2 the pushups of the previous day's 1st set
day 5, 6 -> pushups according to the schedule
day 7 -> 1/2 the pushups of the previous day's 1st set
My rationale for doing some pushups instead of the full set of pushups on the "off" days is so I can give the muscles SOME rest, but not necessarily the amount I would if I were bench pressing for example.
Off with you, pushup monkey. Off!
5/17/2007
Additional Information
A few factoids 've found:
- in doing a standard pushup, you are pressing approximately 60% of your body weight
- doing a pushup on your knees equates to pressing approximately 35% of your body weight
Taking into account this info, after doing a set of pushups to failure, you can go to your knees and continue doing pushups to burn your muscles out and get DIESEL. Diesel, baby, diesel! This technique will also likely help increase strength so you can do more pushups in each set.
A problem I've run into while doing my pushups is breathing. I'm not sure how to breath. Do I inhale on the way down and exhale on the way up with every rep? Then I feel like I'm hyperventilating. Currently, I semi-hold my breath, semi-breathe when I need to, but I'm always out of the breath at the end of the set. I think it's contributing to my numbers. If I could breathe better, I bet I could do more pushups.
5/15/2007
A milestone and a thought
Well, i guess it's not really a milestone. But ... I had to go to 5 sets today to do 70 pushups. Albeit, I had just woken up and was still tired. Since the five pushups set was breached however, I'm starting to consider what are my options are to maintain my current rate of increase. I'm also considering adding another (a 2nd) superset at night or some removed time. The only problem with that I'm not sure I'd be able to maintain when I get busier at work.
My thought is regarding the on/off days. I think I like doing three days on, one day off, two days on, one day off. That fits very nicely into the "one week" paradigm. Also, I was thinking that if I do that, I can actually do the next days's pushups (that I would not do otherwise) on the night before my day off. That way I'm not missing very many pushups and it's a last hoorah before the off-day. We'll see how it goes.
Fight to the end.
5/12/2007
What if...
Instead of doing my sets to failure, I did equal sets of pushups. For example, today I did 34, then 14, then 11, then 6 pushups. And each set was to failure. Could I do more pushups if I just did 20 pushups a set? That would definitely get me further along. The good news from today is I found out that I hadn't maxed may 4 sets yesterday.
If my goal is to eventually do 1000 pushups continuously, shouldn't I continue to do sets to failure? Maybe I'll try the 4 sets of 20 and see how I do with it.
5/11/2007
4 set maximum
I just hit my 4 set maximum today - doing 63 pushups. I hope I can pick up a few more pushups tomorrow or I'll have to start into a fifth set. I'm not sure how many pushups I have in my fifth set. I hope it's at least 10!
5/09/2007
A little anxiety
I'm starting to feel a little anxious about whether I can maintain this rather steep 3% daily increase in pushups. I'm still doing 4 sets, and I'm willing to do 5 to get to goal, so I have room. But .... I'm starting to feel anxious. I guess we'll see how far I can go before I need to decrease the rate of increase (does that count as a rhyme?).
Here's to fighting the physical AND the mental obstacles!
5/07/2007
Working out the kinks
After today's set, I got an inkling that the 3% incline may be too steep. I was able to complete today's goal in 4 sets, with about a 2 minute break between each set. And with a max set# of 5, I still have some room to maneuver. But if it becomes too steep, I may go back down to 2.5% or 2% incline until I feel I can outpace it again.
The other issue is the two days on, one day off pattern. The funny thing is I feel stronger on the third day than the first two days. So this week I'll try out the three days on, one day off pattern and see how it works for me.
On the plus side, my arms look more tone. My shoulders and traps look bigger, and I feel stronger over all. :) Here's to 1000 pushups!
5/05/2007
An Amendment
As I was doing my pushups today, I thought to myself that I really would rather not do more than 5 sets of pushups. This idea was relevant to steeper incline I have chosen to get to 1000 pushups per day. I decided to go with 3% increase daily instead of 2% to see if I could get to the 1000 pushups faster.
The 5 sets though will end up being the limitation, since there's only so many pushups I can do in 5 sets. If the 3% incline is too steep for me, then I'll go back to the much more sane 2% or even 1.5% incline.
However, if I maintain the current rate, I'll be to 1000 pushups by August 13 - the day after my baby boy is due!!
5/02/2007
A Development
I was enlightened today.
As I first set out to do my one thousand pushups, I had the idea of doing them continuously without stopping. At this rate, I was only increasing my pushups by 5 a week - which was definitely not going to get me to 1000 anytime soon.
Today, I thought to myself, "Myself, wouldn't I be happy if I did 1000 pushups in any combination, with or without breaks?" The answer was resoundlingly "YES." I'd be just as happy doing 1000 pushups throughout the day as I would be doing 1000 pushups continuously within half an hour. Albeit, it would take less time doing it the latter way.
So today I started with 2 sets, each to failure. The first was 28 pushups. The second was 20 pushups. And I probably could have done more. As of today, I will start counting the total amount of pushups I do in the day towards the 1000. One gentlemen had figured out that by increasing your pushups by 2% per day you would be able to get to 1000 by the end of the year. That's the new plan: increase pushups daily by at least 2%.
By goodness, I WILL do 1000 pushups a day by the end of the year!
The idea
Initially inspired by Charles Linster, I decided to start a site/club for people doing pushups - specifically, for doing 1000 push ups. Why 1000 you ask?
Well, I'll tell ya. Anybody, after some practicing and a few months, can do 100 push ups. But not everybody can do 1000. One thousand push ups represents commitment, dedication, and stamina, all things I'm trying to improve in my persona. Secondly, I can't imagine being able to do 1000 push ups and not being fit. Thirdly, it's pretty impressive to tell people that you can do 1000 continuous push ups.
So this site is now the home of the 1000 push up club. Join me if you like. The club is about the commitment to do 1000 pushups a day. It'll be the struggle to get there, along with the small victories, that will keep us going.
Here's to 1000 pushups!