{"id":94428,"date":"2025-08-26T17:27:07","date_gmt":"2025-08-26T17:27:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/94428\/"},"modified":"2025-08-26T17:27:07","modified_gmt":"2025-08-26T17:27:07","slug":"go-slow-brace-your-core-and-dont-let-your-hips-sag-how-to-start-push-ups-well-actually","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/94428\/","title":{"rendered":"Go slow, brace your core and don\u2019t let your hips sag: how to start push-ups | Well actually"},"content":{"rendered":"

If you want to show off how fit you are, you drop and do push-ups. That\u2019s what happens on TV, anyway. In Top Gun: Maverick<\/a>, buff fighter pilots do hundreds of push-ups on a hot tarmac. In the late 90s, Demi Moore wowed audiences by doing one-armed push-ups in the movie GI Jane, then again<\/a> on David Letterman. Once, Michelle Obama and Ellen DeGeneres competed<\/a> to see who could do the most push-ups (Obama won).<\/p>\n

Are push-ups really worth the hype? According to fitness experts, absolutely.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn my opinion, push-ups are one of the most underrated movements in fitness,\u201d says Dr Andrew Jagim, director of sports medicine research at the Mayo Clinic Health<\/a> System. Jagim says they are often overlooked because they seem basic, but if you practice them regularly, over time, you\u2019ll likely notice improvements in upper body strength, as well as \u201cposture, core control and overall athleticism\u201d.<\/p>\n

Push-ups can be a good way to assess one\u2019s general fitness. \u201cI\u2019ve learned that how well someone can perform a push-up tells me a lot about their overall movement quality,\u201d says Mark Bohannon, chief experience officer and personal trainer at Ultimate Performance. They also cost no money and can be done just about anywhere.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what you need to know about how to start doing push-ups correctly.<\/p>\n

How do you do a push-up?<\/p>\n

Push-ups require significant upper body strength, but really they are a full body exercise.<\/p>\n

Begin in a plank position, with your hands and toes on the ground. Hands should be placed slightly outside shoulder width, says Bohannon, with fingers spread and facing forward. Feet can be set wide or narrow \u2013 the closer they are, the more challenging the push-up will be, says Joslyn Thompson Rule, Peloton tread and strength instructor. \u201cThe wider your feet are, the more stable your base,\u201d she explains.<\/p>\n

In this position, you activate chest, shoulder and arm muscles, and also your core muscles and glutes. \u201cThe push-up requires full-body stabilization,\u201d says Bohannon.<\/p>\n

Lower yourself until your body is almost touching the ground, keeping your elbows at a 45-degree angle. Then push yourself back up.<\/p>\n

\u201cThink of the push-up as a moving plank,\u201d says Bohannon. \u201cYour body should maintain one unbroken line from the crown of your head to your heels.\u201d<\/p>\n

What are some common mistakes?<\/p>\n

One of the most common mistakes people make during a push-up is not maintaining that line from head to heels. Jagim says he often sees people \u201cletting their hips sag\u201d and \u201cletting the head drop\u201d. (This happens to describe every push-up I\u2019ve ever done.)<\/p>\n

To prevent this kind of cooked spaghetti push-up, brace your core \u2013 \u201cas if someone is about to punch you in the stomach\u201d, Bohannon says \u2013 and squeeze your glutes.<\/p>\n

Jagim says another common mistake he sees is people \u201crushing through reps with poor control and\/or just dropping to the ground and pushing [themselves] back up\u201d.<\/p>\n

Speed doesn\u2019t equal effectiveness, he says. Instead, he suggests aiming for slow, controlled repetitions with proper alignment. This will \u201cmaximize muscle engagement and time under tension, and reduce injury risk\u201d, he says.<\/p>\n

Are there different push-up variations?<\/p>\n

If you can\u2019t do a push-up with proper form, don\u2019t worry \u2013 you\u2019re far from alone, and there are alternatives.<\/p>\n

Bohannon says when he works with clients on push-ups, he often has to \u201cregress\u201d back to a beginner level to ensure people have the proper form.<\/p>\n

If you have never done the exercise before, start with wall push-ups. Stand arm\u2019s length from the wall, then put your hands on the wall and do a push-up with correct form: the body in a straight line, core braced, glutes tight and arms bending at a 45-degree angle. Once you\u2019ve mastered this, you could progress to doing push-ups with your hands on a bench, or with your hands and knees on the ground to reduce the load on your muscles.<\/p>\n

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As you build strength, you can make them more challenging, says Jagim. He suggests progressing to decline push-ups (where your feet are elevated on a box or another stable surface), tricep push-ups (where you keep your hands narrow and elbows tucked close to your body as you descend) or adding weight, like a weight plate, on your back.<\/p>\n

How do you incorporate push-ups into your fitness routine?<\/p>\n

Learning how to do push-ups doesn\u2019t have to consume your life. Rule says she likes to think of push-ups as \u201ca skill that you could spend three to five minutes working on at the start or end of your workout, twice a week\u201d.<\/p>\n

To start, she suggests building up your strength in a plank position: hold a plank<\/a> for 30 to 60 seconds, three to four times. Once that feels comfortable, Rule suggests trying negative push-ups. Start in plank position, and slowly lower down in a controlled way, building up to a 10-second lowering before pushing back up. Repeat this three to four times. After that feels good, she recommends trying isometric holds \u2013 lowering down to a challenging position, and holding for three to five seconds. Do this for a few holds with as much rest time in between as you need.<\/p>\n

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Performing these variations elevated \u2013 say, with your hands on a bench \u2013 can be a good way to maintain form and build strength when you\u2019re starting, Rule says.<\/p>\n

Is there anyone who should avoid doing push-ups?<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you have any kind of shoulder impingement or injury, push-ups will aggravate it, so it\u2019s best to avoid,\u201d says Rule.<\/p>\n

Others may need modifications, especially those with injuries. Push-up handles \u2013 these look like pull handles you place on the floor \u2013 can be helpful, he says, as they reduce wrist strain and keep shoulders in a more stable position. And if in doubt, ask a personal trainer how to do push-ups safely for your body.<\/p>\n

If you hate push-ups, what can you do instead?<\/p>\n

If you absolutely can\u2019t stand push-ups (maybe they evoke bad memories of the presidential fitness test<\/a>), there are alternatives. But Bohannon says it\u2019s worth asking yourself why you hate them.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost exercise hatred stems from repeated failure or poor instruction,\u201d he says. \u201cIf we can regress to the right movement level, improve the quality over time and appropriately progress, the hatred often disappears.\u201d<\/p>\n

That said, he adds, exercises like dumbbell bench presses and machine chest presses can act as alternatives that target many of the same upper body muscles that push-ups do. But they\u2019re not nearly as effective as full body workouts: \u201cWe are losing the extra stability challenges that make push-ups such a valuable exercise,\u201d Bohannon says.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If you want to show off how fit you are, you drop and do push-ups. That\u2019s what happens…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":94429,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[6647,102,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-94428","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fitness","8":"tag-fitness","9":"tag-health","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94428","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=94428"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94428\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/94429"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=94428"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=94428"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=94428"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}