Three years ago I couldn’t even do 1 pushup. Today I did 60

[jesscat]

I used to lurk here on another account. I just wanted to thank you guys for all the advice and tips you gave out on this sub the past few years. It’s been mentally tough and physically of course. But through a lot of hard work and dedication, i reached an achievement i didn’t think I’d ever reach. I know it’s not a lot but to me it shows that you should never give up on yourself. To those just starting out — you got this. One rep at a time. The results will come. You just have to show up for yourself everyday. Thanks again y’all.

Edit: wow, thank you guys for congratulating me! I appreciate every one of you who commented! It definitely helps push me and keep me motivated during my progress! Best wishes to all of you and your journeys!

 

[candycehill]

@jesscat Nice work!

60 push-ups is elite level. I’ve always said that endurance calisthenics is criminally underrated. So much focus on heavy weighted pull-ups and dips etc but mastering your own bodyweight for very high numbers of reps is incredibly tough.

 

[jesscat]

@candycehill Thanks!

Yeah just constantly doing them to failure and in different variations really helped me out. It is really criminally underrated!

 

[candycehill]

@jesscat Indeed.

You should try seeing how many you can do with shakeouts (letting go with one arm and resting it). If you can do 60 normally then you will be able to do 100+ with this method.

And also what helped me build a lot of endurance was ladder training. 1 rep, 2 reps, up to as many reps as you want in the fastest time. It’s very easy, until it’s not, and then it’s brutally difficult: but it’s a great way to build up max reps I’ve found. Done 1-30 pull-ups and 1-50 dips….. xD

But yes, 60 reps normally is a rare achievement and even many advanced callisthenics athletes cannot do this. Be proud and keep going.

 

[davidcarroll]

@candycehill He said push ups lol

 

[candycehill]

@davidcarroll You can let go with one arm doing push-ups as well…..

 

[jely]

@candycehill What would be the purpose of that?

 

[candycehill]

@jely It’s a good way to build endurance by allowing you to perform more reps in a given set. It also really taxes your core and chest/shoulder/tricep stability and control by holding the push-up position for a longer period of time. It’s a similar reason to why people do pull-ups and shake their arms out which really helps build grip strength.

I’ve trained push-ups and pull-ups in this way for a long time and it’s really skyrocketed my muscular endurance. Lactic acid buildup is a lot slower now when I go for long and high rep sets.

 

[debbie3832]

@candycehill What rest time(s) do you typically use between rungs of the ladder?

 

[candycehill]

@debbie3832 Well the goal is to do it in the fastest time possible so no defined rest, but inevitably rest times increase as you go up the ladder, as you become more fatigued and have to do larger and larger sets. The first few rungs I basically rested maybe 5-10 seconds, but this ended up becoming 2-3 minutes towards the end. Pull-ups the rest was not so long as I would just rely on shaking arms out if I couldn’t hit the number of reps in one go, but dips was brutal as there was no way to properly rest on the bar.

 

[veritas1]

@jesscat Hell yeah, dude! Congrats!

 

[jesscat]

@veritas1 Appreciate it dude!

 

[ica]

@jesscat Did you do every set to failure? Or only the last one? Thanks in advance!

 

[jesscat]

For those who wanted to know my training schedule!

While I know this is a bodyweight sub I believe what truly helped me was weighted push-ups. I went from 40 to 60 this year alone by wearing a 40lb pack and doing 4 sets of 8 with it on.

What got me to 40 was negatives and pike push-ups. I did both variations until failure 3x a week. And greasing the groove, basically when I got up I did a set of push-ups, usually about half of what I could do. I did that until this year when I started weighted push-ups!

 

[justfortoday]

@jesscat What does your setup for weighted pushups look like? Do you use a weighted vest or something else? Till now I have been placing 2x6kg dumbells in a backpack and use it as weight but I have not been able to find a way to further increase the weight because that backpack cannot handle any more weight.

 

[jesscat]

@justfortoday I have a backpack I got off Amazon and I just put a 40lb dumbbell in it! Works fine for me. If you’d like I could dm you a link of the backpack I use?

 

[justfortoday]

@jesscat Yess please. I would love that

 

[dawn16]

@jesscat How would training using weight with low reps (4×8) translate into improving your max one set endurance, i.e. 60 straight reps?

 

[sarra]

@dawn16 Because after you do the weighted version of an exercise the bodyweight one become so easy that you fly, even not specifically training for endurance.

 

[dawn16]

@sarra I have wondered about that, but I would think you would have to train specifically for endurance. I may give it a try for a period of time and see if my total max reps in a set increase.