jadocs

Your not serious are you?

Edit: pretty sure your joking

mcours2006

Absolutely, but that's just my opinion based on folks I know.

wphamilton

According to this chart it's not far off. 10 is in the "below average" range.

caloso

Oh, hell. I could have stopped at 31? Dang.

Carbonfiberboy 

Heck, I'm off the frigging scale.

redlude97

I do pushups regularly to keep climbing elbow tendinitis at bay. Just did 40 in ~1 min to confirm I could. Biggest thing is to keep elbows in towards the side to get full benefit

mcours2006

That could be really good...or really, really bad.

jadocs

Current Army minimum (red) and maximum (green = 100 points - you can go over) standards by age group (two minute time limit).

So I'm not sure I agree with the chart several posts up. That would imply that the Army is composed of excellent physical specimens across the board.

wphamilton

New goal for Carbonfiberboy, max out the army chart.

jadocs

Piece of cake

Lemond1985

Do the women do standard men's push-ups (i.e., tested with a cupped hand under chest)? That test could prove quite challenging (and stimulating) for the Drill Sgt.

jadocs

Body has to form a straight line from shoulders to ankles. A correct push up is when the entire body lowers as a unit until upper arms are at least parallel to the ground...then return all the way up as a unit.

mcours2006

We are talking about consecutive/continuous set, right? If a 51 year-old can do 59 consecutive reps, then yeah, they are super physical specimens.

Lemond1985

Sperm bank material, definitely.

caloso

Okay, now I have a goal: 59 pushups before May 3.

Lemond1985

Now to find a 59 year-old who can do 51 consecutive pushups, that would be even more impressive.

caloso

I have a cousin who's a nationally ranked age-group triathlete. I bet he could. I should ask.

mcours2006

For anyone who does any kind of resistance training, whether it's with free weights, machines, or even just body weight exercises, doing push ups is not a huge challenge. But for those who don't weight train, like a lot of cyclists and runners, doing even a set of ten is a huge challenge. But as others have noted, it doesn't take too long to train yourself to do a set.

C'mon, do I need to post that photo of a shirtless Chris Froome?

Lemond1985

That would be the 4th time this week.

I think you can train to do 40-50 at almost any age, though most people are gonna need some gradual ramping up. IMO, only someone who's a really true athlete could do something like that without training for it (and there are such people). Either that or they already lift weights regularly.

jadocs

Yes consecutive and you have 2 minutes to do them properly. As soon as you lift your hand, or foot, or drop to your knee, you are done.

As previously mentioned, anyone who has done upper body resistance training, or simple push ups for that matter can do this very easily.

fstrnu

I cheated on my second attempt of the first workout from the 100 push up plan posted here. I doubled the recovery between sets from one minute to two minutes. Was able to get through the session and grab 6 reps on the last (5+) set.

canklecat

This got me back into doing a few pushups a day throughout the day, not part of a "workout," just to get my upper body back into decent shape. I've noticed it's helping on bike rides -- I can support my upper body more easily, less tiring, less neck cramping on chipseal and rough pavement.

Even when I was in top shape I could never do 73 year old Jack Palance one-arm pushups. He was a bad, bad man.




When I was in Navy boot camp we had a guy who could do one-arm pullups -- no assist from the other arm. I've never seen anything like it before or since. I've seen many folks claim they can do one-arm pullups, but then they'll use their free hand to assist by grabbing the other wrist or forearm. Not this guy. He was a stealth badass. Looked like Matthew Modine in Full Metal Jacket, but hard as a rock. About halfway through boot camp he got bored, got a call from an ocean based oil rig company offering to hire him for a lot of money, so he claimed he lied about drugs on this entrance exam, claimed he'd done a buttload of LSD, etc. Frankly I thought he was one of the sanest, best adjusted young guys I'd met. Low key, low drama, the kind of guy you'd want on your side in a fight. Anyway, off he went back to the real world to make money.

fstrnu

Carbonfiberboy 

I think the plan is a lot easier to execute when you're 20. Try 2 days between workouts.

fstrnu