The benefits of push-ups for women: what does this exercise do and what muscles does it strengthen?

Push-ups for beginner girls

Girls who decide to start leading a healthy lifestyle by playing sports should learn the classic version of the exercise. To do this, you should lie upright, place your hands with your palms down at shoulder level, straighten your legs and rest your toes on the floor. The back should remain straight throughout the entire exercise, the butt should be pulled in as much as possible.

Do not fully open your elbow joints; tension should remain in the pectoral muscles. The body should not remain in the upper position for more than a second. Proceed to bending your elbow joints. Make sure that your bent elbows are not directed towards your heels, but are spread out to the sides.

Full release of the body to the floor should be avoided even at the very beginning of the exercises. The very next day, when the muscles are restored, pain will appear where the tension was maximum:

• in the chest area;
• in the buttocks area;
• triceps;
• in the area of ​​the transverse abdominal muscles.

The very first lesson should not exceed 25 push-ups. The load should constantly increase, not only from the total number of exercises performed, but also from increasing complexity and alternating types. First, you should develop a push-up pattern and then try to stick to it.

If your muscle development does not allow you to start with the classic version, you should simplify the task and start doing push-ups with your knees resting. This version of the exercise is also aimed at strengthening the muscles of the pectoral and back girdle, pumping up the arms and shoulders.

Watch a video about the technique of doing push-ups for girls.

Press into the floor on your palms and knees. The body should be kept straight, palms at shoulder level. Alternately bend and straighten the elbow joint, maintaining tension in the pectoral muscles while lifting and releasing the body.

Painful sensations the next day will help you figure out which muscles work when doing push-ups.

Classic push-ups

Classic push-ups are very easy to perform exercises. But before you start, you need to train by doing easier options. The correct push-up technique for girls:

1. We rest our toes and palms on the floor. We place the body perpendicular to the floor;
2. With our arms bent at the elbows, we lower ourselves until our chest touches the floor.
3. Slowly, as you exhale, return the body to its original position.

Regular performance of this exercise contributes to the formation of raised, attractive breasts.

Important! We do all exercises for effort while exhaling, relaxation – while inhaling. When doing push-ups, inhale while lowering (relaxation), exhale while pushing up from the floor (force).

How to learn to do push-ups

If you tried to do a bench press, but couldn’t do a single push-up, you need preliminary training for beginners. They are simplified, but still put stress on the right muscles.

Note! If the first stage seemed too simple to you, you can immediately move on to the next one. The first stage will allow girls with practically atrophied muscles to move from the “dead point”

Step 1

We won't go horizontal at first. For training we will need a regular wall. Stand opposite the surface (about a meter from it), rest your hands directly in front of you.

Lean your hands on the wall (make sure your feet don’t slip) and “push up” from the wall so that your forehead touches it every time. Do several repetitions until you feel tired. Train in this way every day for 1-3 days and then move on to the next step.

Step 2

We move to a horizontal position and do the usual push-ups, but with bent knees. The shins can be raised up or left lying on the floor. The second option is much simpler. At this stage, you can also do push-ups from a table or bench, if one is available.

Continue doing push-ups with your knees bent until you can do 20 confident, methodical push-ups. Begin to gradually move to a full lying position. For example, perform 1-2 classic push-ups for 15 push-ups with bent knees. Do 1-2 sets to start.

Over time, you will be able to get up from your knees and do full push-ups with a narrow position, then with dumbbells and other weights. With constant training, even push-ups on one arm will become available to you.

How many times to do push-ups in the morning

It is advisable to limit yourself a little in push-ups so as not to overwork your muscles. If you decide to exercise daily, you don’t need to overwork yourself.

To determine the number, do as many push-ups as you can in the morning. Take 60-80% of this number, round up and do push-ups this number of times as exercise. This way you will know how many push-ups you need to do per day.

You can make it even simpler - use round numbers. For example, do 10 or 20 push-ups in the morning. After charging, you should have some reserve of energy left, because there is still a whole day ahead.

If you are well prepared and practically do not feel tired after several dozen push-ups, raise your legs to a slight elevation or use weights. At the same time, carefully monitor the condition of your joints, because the load on them will increase.

Can girls do push-ups?

Very often I have heard really funny arguments against push-ups for girls. All of them are somehow connected with the chest. To close this issue forever, let’s look at the most common “cons”:

“Push-ups enlarge the breasts and deteriorate the mammary glands”

The interesting thing is that not a single person who told me such nonsense could explain what “worse” means. Firstly, no exercise can enlarge your breasts. Secondly, push-ups enlarge the pectoral muscles, which have nothing to do with the mammary gland.

“Push-ups make breasts smaller”

To reduce the percentage of fat in your chest, you need to actively lose weight. Push-ups, of course, help get rid of fat, but not as much as a regular treadmill. Have you ever noticed that almost all models from the world of sports have silicone breasts? Now, it's not because of the push-ups. These are diets and fitness.

“If you do push-ups during lactation, your milk will disappear”

This argument amuses me the most. My good friend answered him very wittily: “If women lose milk from push-ups, then men can’t pump up their abs - sperm will disappear.” I will repeat once again that the pectoral muscles have nothing to do with the mammary glands.

Doing push-ups incorrectly can backfire, but this applies to both men and women. Below we will talk about the benefits and possible harms of exercise.

Are there any harm from them?

Push-ups can only be harmful if you have problems with the shoulder or elbow joint . In this case, you can only make the problem worse.

If everything is in order with your health, then you have nothing to fear, there will be no harm, there will be one continuous benefit. Except for one thing.

As I already said, push-ups develop the pectoral muscles. Those, in turn, visually enlarge and lift the breasts.

But there is one caveat. If the pectoral muscles of girls are overdeveloped, then the breasts do not look very good, to put it mildly.

But I will reassure you that it is very difficult to pump up the pectoral muscles with push-ups, so you don’t have to worry.

Benefits and harms

Push-ups from the floor or wall can not only help improve your shape, but also pose a risk to a woman’s health

To understand whether this type of exercise is suitable for a particular person, it is important to analyze the potential benefits and harms of the activities in question.

Based on the comparison table above, doing push-ups will be useful for all girls who do not have health contraindications, but only if they follow the rules for organizing the training process.

How to do push-ups correctly for girls

It’s somehow a shame to recommend push-ups to guys - they should know themselves that the pectoral muscle is everything to them! Therefore, this article is written for the female gender.

Why do women need push-ups? How to do push-ups correctly?

Push-ups look unfeminine and we must accept this as we accept the sunrise, that is, no offense. My experience with push-ups was... difficult. I didn’t like this thing, but I still did push-ups, as the video trainers taught.

…The beauty of fitness is that it works whether you like it or not. Being a hedonist, I am for the love of the process, which gives rise to endorphins. But if I can’t get the nerotransmitter that spreads pleasure throughout the body, I just endure it. Sometimes patience gives birth to love...

This is what happened with push-ups. At first, push-ups were my only arm exercises. There were no dumbbells. I didn’t even have the idea of ​​getting dumbbells - and I don’t care about biceps and triceps. And so, peacefully doing push-ups for myself, no more than 10 times a day, I felt how the muscles of the shoulder, forearm, and at the same time the pectoral muscles had tightened. The feeling was strange, not even entirely pleasant - the hands were so dense to the touch!..

The period just came when those unpleasant extra five kilos began to go away, and I noticed pleasant changes in my body:

• - improved posture;
• - strengthened back muscles;
• — arm muscles tightened;
• - the chest muscles tightened - the décolleté area began to look graceful.

These changes could only be associated with push-ups.

After thinking about it, I found a few more reasons to do push-ups:

• — push-ups, by the way, are an exercise for the stomach, which has always been and is my problem area;
• — when doing push-ups, we work with our whole body, so we spend a lot of calories;
• — Push-ups increase the strength of your arms and the whole body.

Learning to do push-ups is simple - do two push-ups every day, and when you feel that they are too easy for you, start doing three. If you feel that three is not enough, do four. I personally know girls who can do 30 push-ups in one approach! And they are not jocks at all.

The plank will help you get used to push-ups - an excellent static exercise.

Push-ups are a very democratic exercise that does not require any special skills or abilities.

It is important to follow just a few rules:

• - hands should be under the shoulders, and not under the head or stomach;
• - from the heels to the back of the head - a straight line;
• - do not tilt your head or throw it back;
• - inhale while lowering. Exhale as you rise.

The distance between your hands may vary depending on what muscles you need to work. The wider the arms, the greater the load on the pectoral muscles; the closer the arms are to the body, the more tense the triceps.

You can make push-ups more difficult:

• - raising your legs to a height (from 2 cm to 30 cm);
• - raising his leg.

If you rise to this level, you are my guru. And people know how to do push-ups on one hand, with a clap, on their fists, on their fingers, and the like - phew!

You can do push-ups by turning over on your back and placing your hands on the floor under your back - we train your triceps.

Well, what's the result? I fell in love with push-ups and now do 15 times every day, 3 sets. Not much, but promising.

Do you like to do push-ups?

What happens if you do push-ups every day?

To recover after a full workout, muscles need 7-10 days.

BUT, if we are talking only about push-ups and there are no other exercises, then you can do push-ups every day .

But it is advisable to cycle the load, for example, vary the number of approaches or repetitions; you can also play with rest between approaches.

If you do everything correctly, then doing push-ups every day, a girl can increase the strength of her pectoral muscles and triceps and thereby increase the number of push-ups that she can do in one approach if she does push-ups every day.

Options for ready-made programs for girls

If a woman is a beginner athlete, and she currently does not have the opportunity to turn to the services of fitness trainers, she can use the universal option of a ready-made program. Such push-up complexes are designed for girls aged 20-35 years who do not have serious contraindications to sports.

Weekly training plan

During the week, a woman needs to do push-ups 4-5 times a week, starting and ending the workout with a warm-up and cool-down, respectively. The main part should not exceed 3-4 variations of the exercise. Following these rules will help avoid muscle overtraining:

1. Monday:

• warm-up – 5 – 7 minutes;
• classic push-ups from the knees – 8 times;
• classic push-ups – 8 rubles;
• “crystal” push-ups (with palms pressed together) – 7 rubles;
• wall push-ups – 7 rubles;
• cool down – 3 min.

1. Wednesday:

• warm-up – 6 minutes;
• push-ups with feet elevated – 7 rubles;
• push-ups from a hill with wide arms – 10 rubles;
• Triceps push-ups – 10 rubles;
• cool down – 3 min.

1. Friday:

• warm-up – 5 – 7 minutes;
• bench push-ups – 12 rubles;
• push-ups from the reverse position – 12 rubles;
• push-ups from the knees – 10 rubles;
• push-ups from the floor with supporting limbs positioned close to each other – 10 rubles;
• cool down – 3 min.

1. Sunday – repeat Wednesday’s complex, increasing the load using sports equipment and the number of repetitions by 2.

Table for 30 days

To achieve results from push-ups in the shortest possible time, girls are recommended to adhere to the table calculated by fitness trainers for 30 days of daily exercise:

From scratch: scheme for beginners

To learn how to do push-ups “from scratch,” girls should gradually increase the number of repetitions, while monitoring their well-being both during classes and during the recovery period.

After completing the seventh week of push-ups, the athlete should switch to a narrowly focused training program with increased load on a specific muscle group.

How to do push-ups for women

To achieve maximum results from push-ups, girls should periodically change the load (use additional weight) and perform various variations of the basic exercise:

Name of push-up variation

Short description

Classic push-up

Lie on the floor, place your hands on the backs of your hands, feet on your toes. Lift your body from the supporting surface, while avoiding the formation of deflections in the lower back. As you exhale, get as close to the floor as possible, bending your arms to do this. Without stopping at the bottom, slowly return to the original position

At the moment of lifting, it is important to ensure that the body does not “dive” and that the back is as straight and tense as possible.

Wall push-ups

Turn your face to the wall, placing your feet a little further away. Feet together, back straight, place your palms on the supporting surface so that the body is at a slight angle

Slightly pushing your chest forward, while exhaling, bend your elbows and bring your body closer to the wall. After holding at this point for 2-3 seconds, smoothly return to the starting position.

Reverse push-ups

Stand with your back to a bench or other hard surface. Rest your hands against the support, stretch your legs forward, placing them on your heels. Controlling the position of your back (it should be straight and not move away from the bench throughout the entire exercise), bend your elbows, bringing your buttocks as close as possible to the floor, but without touching it. Without stopping at the bottom point, straighten your arms, as if “squeezing” the muscles.

Basic mistakes when doing push-ups

Often in the gym you can see a girl doing push-ups from the floor, but she doesn’t do it entirely correctly.

Let's look at the main mistakes in technology:

1. Head too low

Keep your spine straight while performing the exercise.

When you tuck your chin too low and extend your neck downward, it puts undue pressure on the cervical vertebrae. This can lead to protrusions and hernias.

In addition, it seems that you have lowered yourself enough and the muscles, due to the small range of motion, will not receive the proper load.

1. Hand position

The correct position of the hands is at chest level, not shoulder level. By spreading your elbows out to the sides at a 90-degree angle, you overload your shoulder joints, which can lead to injury if done consistently.

The angle between the elbows and the body at the lowest point should be about 45°.

When lowering, try to move your elbows not straight to the sides, but back, pressing them closer to the body. This is the safest position for the joints.

1. Excessive arching in the lower back

A large arch in the lower back is a consequence of relaxation of the abdominal muscles. By protruding your pelvis, you create unnecessary stress on the lumbar region and prevent the core muscles from doing their job.

When performed correctly, the pelvis is twisted downwards, and the hips and abs are maximally tense.

1. Fast execution

By quickly going down, you activate inertia, which takes away part of the load.

To properly work out your muscles, perform the exercise at a medium pace, controlling the ascent and descent phases.

It is better to do 6-8 repetitions with the correct technique in several approaches than 15-20, but not as effective.

1. Improper breathing

You should exhale with effort, that is, when you rise up. We take a short breath on the way to the lowest point.

Improper breathing or holding it increases blood pressure and creates unnecessary stress on the cardiovascular system.

Push-ups: benefits and harms

How useful are push-ups, what do they give? What exactly is the benefit? With the right technique, you can achieve the following results:

Increased endurance

When doing push-ups, proper breathing is especially important. Proper breathing always means increased endurance. Aesthetic breasts

If you have large breasts, push-ups will make them look toned. If it’s small, it will be visually enlarged. Good metabolism. Improved blood circulation throughout the torso will lead to faster metabolism. If you eat more, you gain weight less (this does not mean that you need to forget about healthy eating). Beautiful hands. Flabby arm muscles are an age-related problem. If you do exercises, it will be unfamiliar to you. Good hit. Fist push-ups are especially good. If you need to hit someone, I won’t envy him.

Of course, push-ups can harm your body and figure. So, for example, a girl can get pumped up arms or breasts, tear or pull muscles. Also, you should not start exercises with contraindications:

• Inflammatory processes in the elbow joints.
• Injuries and curvatures of the spine.
• Diseases of the cardiovascular and respiratory systems.

Advice from professionals

In order for a novice athlete to form a complete understanding of the features of performing push-ups, she should familiarize herself with the opinions of professionals on this issue.

Anna Drobina, fitness instructor

Anna believes that push-ups should rightfully be considered a basic exercise and be included in the training program of the vast majority of girls, regardless of the purpose of their exercise. This type of load involves more than 3 main muscle groups and has a minimum number of contraindications to its implementation.

Evgeniy Khodenkov, crossfit trainer

Evgeniy recommends that each of his students monitor the technique of doing the exercises during push-ups. Having worn a brace on the elbow joint for several weeks, he knows from his own experience how dangerous it can be to ignore the rules, in particular the need to control the direction of the elbow and maintain a bent position of the arm in its original position.

Elena Bagina, fitness trainer

Elena includes push-ups both in the set of exercises for her clients who want to lose weight, and for those who want to maintain their figure or achieve an increase in the total mass of the muscle corset. In her opinion, push-ups are one of the few universal exercises that are easy to perform and have a number of gentle options for increasing the load.

Push-up program for beginner girls

Despite all sorts of horror stories about the small muscle mass of the upper body compared to men, learning how to do proper push-ups for beginner girls is not so difficult. Try the variations below to find one that you can do with the right technique. Do one approach 2-3 times a day. The number of repetitions per set is as many as you can with the correct technique. When you reach 10 times per set, move on to another preparatory exercise. Do this program until you can do one push-up with proper form. Then move on to an 8-week training regimen.

Plank

First, do a regular plank, then try plank push-ups from the floor.

Bench push-ups

Any elevation can be used. Make sure your buttocks don't sag.

Knee push-ups

Part of the load is removed, because there is no need to push part of the weight (lower body) off the floor.

Push-ups with legs elevated

This exercise is needed to strengthen the muscles of the upper body - chest, shoulders, triceps. At the same time, due to the raised legs, part of the load is removed from the core (abs, back).

Negative push-ups

Do one push-up and at the end touch the floor with your whole body. Return to the starting position without effort.

One push-up

You start from a position on the floor. Push up from the floor and return to the starting position. Once you can do 10 of these single push-ups, move on to regular push-ups.

Corrective exercises to prepare for push-ups

Not progressing as quickly as you would like? Do a couple of sets of exercises below 2-3 times a week.

If the previous exercises helped you train your upper back and triceps, then the two below are aimed at the core (back and abs) and buttocks.

Massage cylinder

Place the massage cylinder under your lower back, lift your upper back off the floor and hold. You can buy such a cylinder on Aliexpress; it is also very useful for self-massage when your muscles hurt after a workout.

Gluteal bridge

Squeeze your buttocks at the top.

Lunges with swing

This exercise is a dynamic stretch for the thigh muscles. Repeat for both legs.

The most important thing in push-ups is the correct technique. Otherwise, the muscles do not receive the necessary load, and the spine may suffer

Therefore, you need to spend time on preparatory exercises. Push-ups may be a more difficult exercise for girls, but that just means you'll have to spend a little more time perfecting the technique.

If you want to pump up your breasts, go see a surgeon. The pectoral muscle itself is not that large, so even pumping it up a little with push-ups will not greatly increase the overall volume of your chest. Don't be fooled by fancy workout programs that promise to use exercises to tighten up sagging breasts or increase them a couple of sizes.

But this does not mean that push-ups are not necessary for girls - they strengthen the core and upper body muscles well.

About the benefits of push-ups for women

A good half of adult men have the so-called “100 push-ups program” on their computer, and in the preface to it it is written that push-ups are needed to increase strength, develop endurance and work out the relief of the pectoral muscles. Would you say that you, dear lady, don’t need strength and endurance at all? It's very, very relative. If you don't know how to do push-ups, you'll feel weird at any fitness class for girls like Taibo or Fitbox. And even in a seemingly relaxing yoga, you will not experience enlightenment when performing Chaturanga. And even if fitness as an independent activity is not among your priorities, the following allows you to think about the benefits of push-ups for the female half of humanity:

• This “simple movement” works not only the muscles of the chest and arms, but also the shoulders, and is considered one of the most useful exercises for a flat stomach. Don't believe me? Try doing push-ups from the floor on your toes, relaxing your stomach. Most likely, you will not be able to complete half of the exercise path;
• a set of push-ups of 3 sets of 10 repetitions with 60 second pauses between sets will allow you to consume 60-100 kcal. Only jumping rope and running at high speed can burn faster. But there are simply no movements that simultaneously develop the muscles of the center of the body and burn so many calories for home training without equipment.

So push-ups are an excellent weight loss fighter.
But with regards to breast enlargement, it really cannot help, which cannot be said about improving its shape. If you regularly do push-ups, your breasts will be high and therefore beautiful. Well, volumes lose significantly in the aesthetics of elasticity. And push-ups for girls also allow you to solve the great problem of how to train your arms without dumbbells, because there are different types of push-ups, which we will continue our topic about.

What kind of exercise is this

Everyone is familiar with push-ups. At a minimum, they include a table of standards for physical education. Initially it seems that it is very easy, but! There are at least 8 techniques and ways to perform the exercise.

Here are just a few of them:

• On one hand. Works the pectoral muscles very strongly. So much so that after a month of regular training you will look like an extra from 300 Spartans.
• "Spider-Man". In this variation, the leg is lifted off the ground and concave at the knee (the knee is near the elbow). The exercise uses the oblique abdominal muscles.
• Push-ups with a ball. Feet are on the ball, hands are on the floor. During the exercise you have to constantly maintain balance. The muscles that support the spine are strengthened and posture improves.

Push-ups at home

Both women and men do push-ups the same way. But achieving different goals also leads to differences in execution technique. If the main thing for men is to outline the relief and pump up their biceps and triceps, then women do not need to inflate their muscles. Their task is to get rid of fat deposits in the arms and shoulders, tighten the waist and correct posture.

Therefore, women are rarely seen doing push-ups on their fingers or fists. There is also no need to weigh yourself down with vests and backpacks with cargo. All girls do is sometimes spread their arms wider, changing the muscle group that takes on the bulk of the body weight.

When performing the push-up exercise, there is no need to rush; you should do it in rhythm with your breathing. Inhalation should be done when the body is lowered, and exhale when it is raised. Fully extending your arms and resting on straight lines means reducing the effectiveness of push-ups from the floor.

If the body weight is higher than normal, then the number of approaches should be reduced, since the load on the arms and shoulders is increased due to the additional weight.

It is necessary to start the lesson by warming up in advance. If you don’t have an exercise bike or treadmill at home, you can limit yourself to doing a set of simple exercises: squatting, rotating your arms, bending, etc.

Correct execution of the exercise

Only systematic implementation will allow you to master the push-up technique. If the starting position is taken correctly, then no external pain sensations (pain in the joints of the forearm) will arise.

The correct way to start the exercise is as follows:

1. The palms of the hands are located slightly wider than the shoulders.
2. The body is straight, the hips are moved forward as much as possible, the back is not like a wheel.
3. Try to always keep your stomach pulled in.

Release your body as low as possible, but you should not lie down on the floor, otherwise the maximum load will immediately turn into rest. Additional exercises to strengthen your abs, hips and back will help you shape your entire body. The whole set of exercises will help you get rid of excess weight and kilograms.

Regular training is the key to the effectiveness of the exercises performed. You should do 3 workouts per week.

It is important to remember that between workouts it is necessary to allow time for the restoration of damaged fibers in the muscles. It takes 24 hours to restore them without stimulation with sports nutrition supplements.

Try to avoid the following mistakes of all beginners:

• Strong lifting of the buttocks can lead to lower back pain and joint pain in the arms;
• a crooked back during the exercise will not correct your posture;
• the load will be distributed incorrectly if you release your stomach down or perform the exercise by moving your head rather than your body;
• the load will not be as full as possible if the body is not released low enough at a distance of 5 cm from the floor.

Push-ups for girls: features

The principle of performing the exercises is, in general, the same for ladies and gentlemen. But still, by definition, the weaker sex is entitled to some concessions.

Traditionally, women rarely perform push-ups with weights, or, say, with emphasis on the knuckles. In addition, it will probably be difficult to find a girl who can repeat Adriano Celentano’s famous trick from the film “The Taming of the Shrew,” when he manages to clap under his chest while doing push-ups.

During classes, ladies are usually content with changing the positions of the body and arms , depending on the goal.

As a standard, your hands are positioned shoulder-width apart or slightly wider than shoulder-width apart.

Push-ups for girls require, as a rule, an average pace, a relatively small amplitude and gentle, careful movements. The back and legs should be kept straight, as if along one line, the palms should be parallel to each other, the stomach should be retracted.

As during any training, be sure to monitor your breathing : lower - inhale, rise to IP - exhale. You can start with literally a few repetitions (5-7), often beginners can’t do more.

Before exercise, you need to warm up slightly. Several squats, arm swings, and walking in place will help prepare the body for the load.

It would also not hurt to remember that, just in case, in order to avoid injury and discomfort, you should remove rings and bracelets, choose comfortable clothes - not tight, but not too loose (for example, excessively long sleeves or wide trousers may interfere).

Main conclusions

1. A girl can achieve results from push-ups only by understanding the specifics of performing the exercise in question, as well as strictly following its technique.
2. Ideally, a fitness instructor should be involved in creating a complex for an athlete. But, if this is not possible, an alternative to an individual plan can be universal programs designed for young girls who do not have health limitations.

Regardless of the place where push-ups are performed, as well as physical fitness, girls should increase the load when playing sports gradually, focusing on their own feelings. Having correctly formed the complex, as well as adjusting the diet and lifestyle in general, a girl will be able to strengthen the muscles of the upper body, as well as develop endurance and shape the relief after 1-2 months of regular push-ups.

Do you know how to do push-ups correctly? Tell us, how often do you include this type of load in your training program and do you feel their effectiveness?