Push Ups

[dratix]

I do sets of push ups daily. I hear you need to wait 24 hours on all muscle groups before you work them out again. Some say you need to skip a day, but I've heard it's okay to do push ups every day and you wont hurt anything. True?

[TheDevilAside]

Just don't do push ups when your upperbody muscles (pectorals/chest, mainly) are sore.

[Squawman]

If you do pushups with just your body weight then you should be just fine doing them everyday because your body gets used to it. When you start adding weight, like bench press then you are trearing the muscle down. Then you need to skip a day while the muscle takes time to rebuild itself.

[Jerry]

Squawman said it ........

[ncole_91]

Thanks for the advice (even though I didn't post the topic)

[Jinxx0r]

You're body needs rest at some point (or it's diminishing returns and potential injury). You're body will tell you when you need to stop. Rest is often overlooked. People think you're not gaining when you're resting, which is just wrong. You're body repairs itself and gets stronger when you get proper rest.

 

You will gain faster if you do it evey other day... just make sure you do good sets.

[ncole_91]

When your extremely soar, all your muscles and you can barely walk..... belive ot or not, this is good because you worked your muscles and if you rest, they are going to repair and become stronger...

[Vito]

thats not true. you only want your muscles to be so sore... if youre extreemely sore and you havent just started, youre pushing them too hard. be careful not to overdo it when lifting.

[kimura_guy]

What yall are saying is partly true. The muscle soreness comes from lactic acid buildup in your muscles. Its called DOMS (delayed onset muscular soreness). It comes from your body and muscles reacting to a new stimulus. Lactic acid comes from a chemical breakdown within your muscles. So in effect you want that soreness. As your body becomes more used to your workouts, youll notice you dont get as sore ( of course everybody is diffrent) Some people always get sore, but, I never get sore. Your muscles arent getting bigger as you workout, they get bigger when you rest. It will not hurt to do pushups everyday ( we did them everyday in marine boot camp, and nearly everyday after boot camp). My advice is to keep on doing them (but dont overdo it). Your body will eventually become accustomed to your workouts.

 

just my 2 cents

 

KG

[SevenStar]

One thing that I noticed hasn't been hit on yet - recovery time is relative to how you are training. For example, If you lift very heavy weights for very few reps (3-5) and low sets (2-3), you are doing training more geared toward pure power - training the neurological system to contract harder. This will make you stronger, but will not put size on you, nor will bring about the onset of lactic acid buildup. You can do this type of training every day.

 

Higher rep activities tend to bring this onset about. weight training with light to fairly heavy weights for higher reps (8 +) and more sets (4 +). exactly how many sets and reps will dictate whether you are strength/mass training or endurance training, however both can result in the lactic acid buildup. In these cases, you want to rest between workouts.

 

The same applies for body weight exercises, like pushups. initially, you may become sore from doing several sets and reps of them - you body isn't used to it, as was pointed out above. That's cool - let your body rest. eventually you will build up to being able to do them every day.

 

BUT, a word of caution here - if you do them everyday, be aware of the number that you do and be cautious not to do too many for too long of a period of time - vary your schedule from month to month. I know several people who have received injury to the shoulder from doing hundreds of pushups every day - one of the most common ways to injure the shoulder and rotator cuff is repetitive stress.