guardian7
Level 6 Valued Member
What is the best depth for pushups?
A lot of pushup tutorials focus on arm placement and keeping a plank position, but few talk about how low to go in the pushup. I used to go right to the floor, almost touching my nose to the floor, but I thought that like a perfect form tactical pullup, the idea would be to lock the scapular rather than let a bit of a concave shape result (chest in front of shoulders), so I am thinking that about the size of say a golf ball under the chest would be about right. Some say to imagine a tennis or baseball under your chest (convict conditioning) but that seems a bit high. I do a strict slow eccentric phase and fast concentric. Others like GMB seem to almost touch the nose and chest to the floor. US Army seems to only have age and rep standards.
I suppose it is related to ones anthropometrics to some extent, but is there an "official" Strongfirst pushup depth that is recommended? I am thinking somewhere between touching the floor and having a baseball under the chest. My theory is related to the position of the scapula in retaining full body tension. I notice that I leak full body tension when I go to full ROM or touch the floor--kind of like relaxing at the bottom of a bicep curl and releasing the tension vs doing cable bicep curls where there is some tension maintained.
Sorry for the long post for such a simple question! I am working on pushup form and weekdaily pushups.
A lot of pushup tutorials focus on arm placement and keeping a plank position, but few talk about how low to go in the pushup. I used to go right to the floor, almost touching my nose to the floor, but I thought that like a perfect form tactical pullup, the idea would be to lock the scapular rather than let a bit of a concave shape result (chest in front of shoulders), so I am thinking that about the size of say a golf ball under the chest would be about right. Some say to imagine a tennis or baseball under your chest (convict conditioning) but that seems a bit high. I do a strict slow eccentric phase and fast concentric. Others like GMB seem to almost touch the nose and chest to the floor. US Army seems to only have age and rep standards.
I suppose it is related to ones anthropometrics to some extent, but is there an "official" Strongfirst pushup depth that is recommended? I am thinking somewhere between touching the floor and having a baseball under the chest. My theory is related to the position of the scapula in retaining full body tension. I notice that I leak full body tension when I go to full ROM or touch the floor--kind of like relaxing at the bottom of a bicep curl and releasing the tension vs doing cable bicep curls where there is some tension maintained.
Sorry for the long post for such a simple question! I am working on pushup form and weekdaily pushups.