You were wondering when the “Fit” aspect of Fiscally Fit Foodie would come into play, weren’t you? Well, here is your first installment, AND you get a video (keep reading, it’s down there somewhere)...with music...and don’t act like you’re not impressed. While the fitness posts may not be as prolific as the recipe and food posts, they should be just as informative for those of you who are interested in a well-rounded, healthy lifestyle.

Picture the following scenario: you’re sitting at home, watching TV on the couch, and all of a sudden you get the feeling that you’re not maximizing your potential...you’re feeling slightly lazy, unproductive, and maybe even have a passing thought that a workout might be a good idea. Hey, it could happen. The problem is that your gym is closed or it is 10-15 minutes away from your house and it’d be inconvenient to go or maybe you don’t have a gym membership at all. One of the great things about push-ups is that you don’t need a gym to do them and they don’t cost you a thing except a little hard work. You aren’t opposed to that, are you? Great – let’s get started then!

Push-ups work several muscle groups including your core/torso, deltoids, shoulders, triceps, and your biceps. In fact, they even increase flexibility by stretching out your biceps. As you age, you are much more likely to experience rotator cuff injuries, and doing push-ups offers some level of protection by strengthening the muscles around your shoulder joints. To maximize the effectiveness of your push-ups, tighten your glutes (yeah, the muscles in your butt) and attempt to keep a straight line from your head to your feet. Don’t allow your stomach/pelvic area to sag toward the ground and keep a strong/tight/flexed core. Basically you’re using almost all your muscle groups to stabilize yourself and perform a push-up, and that’s a wonderful thing. You’re strengthening your lower back, promoting good posture, and increasing muscle tone...which in turn helps you boost your metabolism and burn fat faster.

So what should a push-up look like and what sorts of variations are there for this exercise? Here are nine push-up variations with an increasing level of difficulty and (presumably) what they should look like when you do them:

Can’t do all of those quite yet? Not a problem. Replace any variations that you are unable to perform with standard push-ups and work your way up to the more challenging varieties. Take about 20 seconds between sets and set a goal of doing ten repetitions of each, followed by another round of ten of each (so 180 total). Finish the workout off with as many standard push-ups as you can do. Basically, until you bonk (aka failure). If you can’t do sets of 10, try sets of 5. The key here is that you’re challenging yourself and improving over time. All of this shouldn’t take you much longer than about 15-20 minutes. Not too bad, right?

How often should you do this? Well, it depends on what other sort of physical activities you’re taking part in throughout the week, but once or twice a week is plenty. If you do this workout twice per week, try to space it out so you are only doing it once every 3-4 days. You want to give your muscles time to heal after you work them out hard and, if you’re not accustomed to doing push-ups or core/chest/triceps workouts, you may very well be sore for a day or two afterward. That’s just lactic acid build-up and slight muscle “damage” at a microscopic level and is a perfectly normal sign that you had an effective workout. These muscle fibers mend themselves and come back stronger – which is what they refer to when they say you’re “building muscle.” You can aid recovery by consuming protein within an hour or so after your workout (whey protein is typical and I’ll touch on this in future posts).

DO NOT FORGET TO STRETCH at the conclusion of your workout. Even though this should be a given, I’ll also say that stretching beforehand is a must as well. You know what, that has given me an idea for my next fitness post – next time we’ll cover some stretching techniques for different parts of your body.

There should be tags for each exercise on the video above, but you can print the workout by clicking on this link, or you can just reference the following:

Chest/Core/Arms Workout – 9 Push-up Variations and Burnout (click to print)
Created by Fiscallyfitfoodie.com – James B.

You will do 10 reps of each #1-9, taking an approximate 15-20 second rest between sets, then repeat 10 reps of each #1- 9 (15-20 rest between sets), and finish with standard push-ups to failure.

Stretch for 3-4 minutes

1.   Standard Push-ups

2.   Wide-fly Push-ups

3.   Military Push-ups –  arms in close to sides and elbows come back towards you.

4.   Diamond Push-ups – from push-up position, bring hands together so thumbs and index fingers touch. Align hands directly below heart. Elbows will flare out during push-up.

5.   Staggered Push-ups – from standard push-up position, place one hand slightly more forward than the other and focus weight on that side. Switch hands after every two reps.

6.   Plate/sliding Push-ups – with a gliding plate (linked above), glide into a wide push-up, focusing weight on whichever arm you moved outward. Switch hands after every two reps.

7.   Under-the-fence – do a wide-fly push-up, simulating going back and forth underneath a fence. To modify, do NOT go back underneath fence.

8.   Clap Push-ups – feet wide for stability, arms in standard push-up position, and toes stay on the ground throughout. Push off the ground with substantial force and clap your hands, then catch yourself before you face-plant (key to success).

9.   Plyo Push-ups – Like clap push-ups, but your toes will also come off the ground.

10. Standard Push-ups – do as many possible until failure.

Stretch for 3-4 minutes

You could do this workout, then run to the store and get yourself some fish collars or tuna to make poke for your protein boost too!