Can I do it? I don’t know for certain, but I’m going to give it a try. This might replace my ‘run a marathon’ ‘new year resolution”, as it’s more attainable, and I need to take things a step at a time (no pun intended).
A few days ago I was invited to join some other PHPers in taking this challenge. The ‘support group’ is on Facebook here. I’m only 2 days in to it, and feeling sore all over. But I do think this is something I’ll be able to keep up. Doing 10 on the first day was a stretch, but 10 today is more doable, and I hit 20 today in my last set.
Join up at our Facebook site if you’re interested in taking the challenge with us, or just go to hundredpushups.com directly and take it from there.
I’m putting this in the PHP category as well to let other PHPers (via planetphp) who don’t yet know about the challenge hear the word.
Good luck. Whether in great shape (Taekwondo competitor) or not (drinking heavily at college, etc.) after a couple days of warming my arms back up I always top out at 30 and just do a few sets of 30 a day. I can push myself to 40, but why?
Is there a set pace for these 100 push ups? I can probably quite easily reach 30 if I did them in quick succession but I can also reach my limit with just 15 if I take it slowly.
All push ups are not created equal.
I did not see a set pace for the hundred push up challenge. The weekly workouts tell you to rest between the sets – do 12, wait 90 seconds, do another 12, wait 90 seconds, etc. I’m not sure if the full “100 in a row” is supposed to be fast, or slow, or if it’s more of a ‘whatever works for you’ sort of thing.
I guess as long as you’re pushing yourself it doesn’t really matter.
I think I’ll give it a try when I get home. Ordinarily I would do a set of 15 and adjust my pace to suit rather than changing the number.
I think I’d be very lucky if I managed 15 in a oner.
Good luck Michael, your post inspired me to join the Facebook group and go for it!
Situps are a different story I might add…
Situps? I used to be able to do 50-100 at a time. Now I can barely do 5. I’m so out of shape! Pushups first – one thing at a time!
Well I used to be able to do 50 or so, then I had my strokes and I couldn’t even stand, but my stomach muscles (transverse abdominals – ooh) were badly affected so I’ve had to concentrate on them in the past two years.
I’d say ‘standing’ is far more important than push ups.
Lol. Yeah my priorities had to change a bit…
Wow..nerds exercising?!
/me joins. But don’t expect me to signup to Facebook. 
Last time I was forced to do pushups I managed 35. That test was how many you can do in 60 seconds. Best of us could do about 50-70 pushups so the pace can be that fast.. but how many of those 70 were “clean” pushups, that’s another story.
1st day behind..jfc..I propably can’t use a keyboard tomorrow.
Did 20 in the last level..that might have been a bit too much..
100 pushups can be easy if you just train alot. Mike Tyson can do about 500 in a row, and he does 3 sets of that to make it an even 1500. I did 110 in my Army fitness test and other guys were doing about 50-70 kind of thing. I just do alot of pushups. There was one guy who boasted to a PTI that he could do them all day, and he did over 800 in a row by the time they told him to stop. It just varies from person to person. And also, the Army has very strict guidelines so every pushup has to be all the way down and ALL the way up.
I’m wondering if it’s counter-productive to spread them out during the day! I’ve found that I do the first couple of sets, then another one at work, then another one or two when I get home!
:-O
I’m sure the idea is to ‘stress’ the muscles to exhaustion so they’ll build new fibers during recovery, right?
Good to see other people doing the challenge.
Here’s my progress. I’ve been stuck on week 5 due to time constraints, an almost non existent sleep schedule, and just plain being tired from biking and running.
http://www.fivezerofive.com/main/index.php?itemid=1461
I’ve effectively stopped. I hurt my wrist a couple weeks ago after week 5. I let it rest for a few days and tried week 6. I did day 1, barely, but it hurt too much. I’ve not tried it since.
However, I barely did 15 during my initial test. I did 53 with relative ease after 5 weeks. Would I have been able to get to 100 after week 6? Not likely. After a few more weeks? Sure. So, I’m pretty satisfied with my progress even though I didn’t finish this set. I’ll probably take this up again, or something similar, later on.
To get in shape u dont have to exactlly follow the push up routine for instance if u think its not challenging enough and ur on ur second week(like me) then increase the push up limit or like i did do more sets and reduce the time u rest(i rest 60 seconds even though it says 90 seconds on second week and i do more sets)
I did 7 good-form pushups during my initial test. Last Monday (06/22/09) I wiped out during my last set of Week 2 Day 1. I think its going to take me more than 6 weeks to work up to one hundred pushups, but I’m looking forward to wearing the “I did a hundred” t shirt into my martial arts class. Then I’ll try for 20 chin ups! Does anyone know of a stretching program like this? I’d like to work up to being able to do a full split!
i have downloaded all 4 apps for my i-phone and am doing sit-ups and push-ups on day 1 then pull-ups and squats on day 2 and so on, along with my walking this gives me an all round daily workout which is fun rather than a slog and in answer to the question “why”? above “manboobs” good luck everyone