How to Do More Pushups

Having a toned body is important to many individuals. One area that a lot of people specifically want to tone is their arms. A way to tone your arms and increase your upper body strength is by doing push-ups. Some people aren’t able to do many push-ups at a time but there are ways to increase your strength and gradually increase the amount of push-ups you can do.

Things You'll Need

• Will to exercise
• Upper body strength
• A flat surface
• Push-up bars (optional)

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Instructions

How to Do More Pushups

• 1

  Know how to do a proper push-up. Lie on the floor with your chest down and your hands level with your shoulders. Palms should be face down or if you prefer, you can prop yourself up on your fists. Your feet should be together with your toes tucked under your feet and have your chin touching the floor. Be sure to keep your back straight. Push up with your arms. As you push up your arms should straighten. Then lower your body until your chest touches the floor and repeat the process. Beginners might need to drop to their knees and cross their feet at the ankles. You will still be working out your arms.

• 2

  Count the number of push-ups you’re able to do at a given time. Breaking your push-ups into sets might be helpful to you.

• 3

  Set a goal to increase by a specific number of push-ups within the next week. If you’re able to add five more push-ups a day to your set, by the end of the week you will have increased by thirty-five push-ups if you do push-ups daily.

• 4

  Use push-up bars if doing push-ups hurt your wrists. They have a non-slip grip and they help to relieve extra pressure off of your wrist without minimizing the effectiveness of your push-ups.

• 5

  Lift weights to help you to increase your upper body strength. Having good upper body strength is one of the essential elements in doing push-ups. Gradually increase the weight of your lifts. You will find that this is helpful in increasing the number of push-ups you’re able to do.

• 6

  Give your muscles time to rest. It’s normal for your arms to get tired from exercising and all muscles need time to rest. Just don’t let this rest stop you from exercising. It’s easy to give up if you feel like something is painful or too hard to do. Your arms may be sore for the first few days but once you’re doing push-ups on a regular basis, they won’t be sore anymore.

• 7

  Make sure you’re eating a balanced diet. Proper nutrition goes hand in hand with exercise. Make sure you’re getting enough protein. Meat, eggs, fish, red beans, and protein bars are all good sources of protein. A combination of proper diet and sticking to your exercise routine will help you to increase your upper body strength which will enable you to increase the number of push-ups you can do.