Reassurance that I will get through pushups

I have never been good at pushups and am still not. I am going to be starting pushups for the 3rd time at Week 1. Can anyone reassure me that I will eventually get to the 15 rep range? I do realize that some exercises can take longer than others, but am afraid I will be stuck on pushups forever.

I am wondering if I add a 3rd day of just pushups may help with progressing.

I can assure you that a healthy bodied person with reasonable conditioning and work ethic (or any two of the three) *can* get to the 15 rep range.

Whether *you* will, is on you (in the nicest possible way ). A 3rd day might help, or you might be gaining strength right on schedule and be set in the habit of stoppin n floppin after a rep or two.

The important thing is that you are getting stronger. If you are beating your head against the wall with it, then change something. Instead of jumping straight to the floor, use a halfway height incline (half what you used forthe PE1) and get your volume up to week 8 or 12 before dropping it further.

That is just one example; there are always tweaks to make the exercises harder or easier as required you may also wish to post a video for form pointers.

If you put the time in, the answer is an emphatic yes.

I work in the martial arts industry, and an out-of-shape woman came in just after the New Year hoping to get in shape.  She could barely do 15 kneeling pushups, let a lone a full push-up.  I coached her, and in three months she improved to 40+ kneeling pushups and 12-15 full pushups.  It's now been six months since she started and she now regularly does 20 pushups without complaining.

It wasn't fast, but if a mother who hadn't been in shape since high school 20 years ago can do it, so can you.  Believe!

You will. Sometimes progress is just excruciatingly slow - but it will come. 

You'll get there!

I've had to start a few progressions at week 1 or week 5 a few times in a row.  Now I've switched to the micro or mini cycles instead.

Maybe going from PE1 to knees to PE2?

Could you post your 3rd week reps, that may be informative.

If you add a 3rd workout, I'd recommend doing the reps and sets of the deload week.

You get the exposure, but it won't tax you as much.

It took me about 9 months to master it. I spent 85% of that time stuck at around 4x12reps and it just never seemed it would budge. But... it did. Part of it what taking a serious look at my form, I make a detailed post about this a few months back, actually.

Agree with bigB, a video of your week 3 reps, and a video of your week 11 of HBP/PE1 reps to make sure you demonstrated mastery there, would be helpful for us to give you advice.

No you wont succeed.

Now, if i meant it would that stop you?

Of course you can do it, if you want it bad enough. Doesn't matter who says what, you can do anything.

Pushups respond great to daily work or even to greasing the groove.  Get on them and you will get through them within a relatively short time period and be all the stronger for it!

Progress on this one has been slow for me, too. It's a brutal number of pushups in a short time period.  I've been addingly only 1 rep per week and it has definitely taken grit. I have seen progress nonetheless and have no doubt you will if I can.

You might try working at an intermediate incline to decrease the load you're trying to push. For example, let's say you're using the 3rd stair from the bottom of a staircase to get the approximate angle for PE1. Instead of jumping right into PE2 on the floor, try working some pushups on the 2nd and 1st stairs first. You'll increase the weight more gradually and ease yourself into the full pushups.  Good Luck!

You're not alone. I've been trying to get to 4x12 for about 3 months now. I finally found progress by doing GTG (tried a few things before that).

On days that I don't have pushups, I do 10 times the reps I'm shooting for throughout the day. So for 4x12, I do 120 pushups on non-pushup days. 12 pushups every 45 minutes throughout the day until I hit 10 sets.

I just did 4x12 successfully tonight, but the last 2 reps weren't mastery. Getting there.

Good luck!

-Nash

You totally can. It might be helpful for you to post a vid of a set of push ups. We might find some areas of improvement can help you progress faster.

I've been making good progress with a lower volume/higher frequency approach. Also adding harder variations seems to make regular pushups easier.

I'm currently doing three days per week for three sets. Regular on Monday, feet elevated on Wednesday, and diamond pushups on Friday. It's not the prescribed programing but seems to be working for me.

Thank you all for the suggestions, I will try to work some of them in to see how it goes. I had previously recorded a set of 3x3 on my 2nd time through starting the first micro cycle and posted in a previous form check, here is that video

Now I videoed again after I posted this post on trying to get through these pushups and this is my second set of 3x6

I think it looks worse than the video above and it was weeks later, so not sure how to really go about it. Think I just need to concentrate on staying straight and with time the strength will get better.

Your arm strength is improving.  Your body line will improve as you get better at the FL elements.  Holding that posterior pelvic tilt fromt the FL will help keep your low back from sagging a little as you drop down into the pushup.  Then you won't feel the need to have your hips piked slightly up to compensate.  Keep working on the arm strength here, and as someone else mentioned above, it may be helpful to put a slight incline, maybe 6 inches, to give yourself better ability to hold a straight body line, then once you can do a fair number of those, drop to the ground level.  Keep up the good work.

looks like on the second video your leaning too far forward, like your attempting a half PPP. Also i wonder if you should work up to perfect elbow positioning by first getting stronger at elbows out abit. right now they come directly backwards, but flaring elbows out is easier. 

If im wrong about that someone will point it out, quickly. 

Edit: yes it appears you dive forward on the way down, instead of keeping a normal bodyline throughout

I don't want to confuse so i'll keep it short. 

Nordic and Raj have great feedback for you, the only thing i'd add is something I sometimes have a tendency of doing when i grind reps out (used to happen to me in inclined pushups as well) and that's to "chicken" my neck to the ground to look for depth in the pushup. that's why i think you might be leaning forward and then moving yourself backwards, so keep your entire body rigid. thinking that im doing a plank and just moving my arms is enough visual for me to remember to keep it classy. 

I mention the rigid body and chicken head movement because if you stay rigid and keep your neck neutral(just looking between your hands or right where you know your nose is going to touch the floor), your chest will touch first. that's about it, because from the first to second video you posted you drastically changed the "jump" at the top. just work on staying rigid and not moving your head(that eliminates the forward lean contributed by looking for depth with your torso and leaning forward with your toes, which im sure you can feel makes the pushup much more challenging)

In addition to what Keilani and others said, I've personally found that really squeezing my glutes and continuing to actively squeeze them throughout the movement pretty much eliminates the possibility of piking at the hips while doing push-ups and ; it also helps in maintaining PPT as well.

RJS said:

looks like on the second video your leaning too far forward, like your attempting a half PPP. Also i wonder if you should work up to perfect elbow positioning by first getting stronger at elbows out abit. right now they come directly backwards, but flaring elbows out is easier. 

 

If im wrong about that someone will point it out, quickly. 

 

Edit: yes it appears you dive forward on the way down, instead of keeping a normal bodyline throughout

Well in pushups I have been told that the elbows should always remain over the wrist through the whole movement, and that the first movement should be shoulder forward first, maintaining the elbow over wrist.

Also I am aware that people say that elbows out a bit is easier but it is actually weird that I find elbows in easier for me. If I do elbows out at about a 45 degree angle it is harder for me, thats why i have always done elbows in. Maybe I need to start doing different variations and maybe that will help me get stronger

You are leaning forward during the PU. Trying looking at a spot directly below your eye level (at the ground) from the top of the plank and keep your eyes fixed on it as you go down. This should prevent you from leaning forward. The forearms wont stay 100% vertical so don't worry about it.   Also if you find it hard to finish a set, trying adding in slow (10s) negatives to finish the set. Or for a week or two try breaking up the repetitions of each set with a 10-15s break. This should allow you to squeeze an extra rep or two in.