In defence of the humble push-up.

I won't hold you for long. The humble push-up is a fabulous exercise for building shoulder and tricep strength and your core as well! 

Set your feet at least shoulder width apart to support your stability. More stability in any movement allows the bigger, stronger muscles to devote more of their performance to the target movement (instability causes these muscles to be coopted into supporting the smaller, stabilisers).

Next comes hand position. There is no one, right position. Closer together and you will load the triceps more, further apart and the chest and anterior shoulders will have a greater proportion of the work. For what it's worth, I am a big fan of treating the triceps like the most important muscle in pressing movements.

There is a single biomechanical pre-requisite for pressing movements, which is the path and stability of the elbow. At all costs, we need to avoid the shoulders blades elevating and rolling the shoulders up and over when we press. To this end, the elbows need to remain slightly tucked throughout the movement, i.e. they shouldn't flare upwards. 

Pressing is punching, essentially. The elbows come from a relatively low position. The second, important effect of a low and controlled elbow position is that we can lower our bodies using our lats for support. This stabilises the shoulder blades and puts us in a good position to éfficiently 'punch' our bodies back up.

One thing that is not important at all is how low we go. One inch with good control will grow the press over time.

Five sets of 5 reps or 3 sets of as many as you can do with 60s rest between.

The humble press-up, complimented by pull-ups, will develop a strong and muscular upper body. It's also a fabulous bridging exercise and hits the core superbly!!

The main points:

• The push-up will develop a strong and muscular upper body and strengthen your core.
• Don't sweat depth.
• Set feet shoulder width apart to aid stability and support the shoulders.
• Hands can be narrow to favour the triceps or wider for more chest/ shoulder.
• The only mechanical necessity is that the elbows remain slightly tucked and don't flare up because this put the triceps and lats in an excellent position to support the push. It also ensures we avoid rolling the shoulders up and over, which we don't want!
• Five sets of 5 reps or 3 sets of as many as you can do with 60s rest between.