I'm talking about the common exercise move where you hold a push up position from your hands or on your elbows.
A few years ago, I started at 20 second intervals x3. Then I did 30 secs x 2-4 depending on that day's workout. I can now do on average 40 secs x 4...x5 if I'm lucky. I feel I should be able to do more but dang my lack of upper body strength.
I wish I can go a whole minute...can you? Anyone out there who can do 2 minutes? or more?
*Do it Jo...you know you wanna ;)
**Hey ya'll...give Jo lots of flowers for her response and if she gets alot we should make her try it!
I'm almost 34 and ya'll are making me feel like an old lady! lol if you can go for a minute, well then by golly, I'm going to go for a minute too. Like Tracy said, its hard though!
My core sucks, plain and simple. I don't do yoga, pilates or anything of the like on a regular basis. I weight train and run.
JB I LOVE the smith machine. If its not too crowded in the gym, I can spend my whole workout on that thing. They say endurance is the key so just up your reps each time and you'll get to those really low push ups. If it makes you feel any better, I can't do push ups that low either but the guys and gals who do (I like to call them "show offs' but that's just my jealousy speaking) look so cool doing them.
Ya'll have inspired me to go for a minute! I will do it! I can do it!
* I just tried doing the insane ones where you take a full step to one side, crunch your leg in, take a step to the other side and repeat. I did almost 2 sets. It was dismal to say the least.
It is kind of a tootsie pop question for me. I get bored at a minute and plop down and do something else.
Meh, maybe if I get bored tonight I will see. :)
Ugh! I hate planks! In my kickboxing class I made it to a minute a few times, but usually I had to stop partway through and start up again. Unfortunately, I lack discipline and haven't been doing them much on my own. Maybe I'll use this post as a reminder to try again today. Wish me luck!
I believe I can "plank" for exactly 0 seconds.
I'd have a better chance of WALKING a plank!
:)
Can..... not.... plank....Ugh.
But I'm impressed with all the rest of you who can.
:o)
Since I haven't done a push up in a really long time I thought that "planking" sounded really easy and I was wondering how the hell someone could only do 40 seconds. Then I tried to do it just to see how long I could go... I made 8 seconds before I said 'f*ck it'. Lol! In my defense, I had to sleep on the couch last night (Oliver spilled water all over my side of the bed) so my back hurts and Oliver was climbing on me while I was trying to do it because he thought I was going to give him a horsey back ride. Lol
Way harder than it sounds!
With me, it depends on if it's at the beginning of a workout or the end of one. When I'm relatively fresh, I can go maybe 45 seconds. At the end of a long workout, forget it! I'm not big on lots of sets. But then, I'm a grandma so I don't need to impress anybody but myself.
I'd like to encourage you to do a little core cross-training. It will definitely help your running.
I'm almost 58 and can easily do 2 minutes -- never timed myself longer. I have my exercise class try to hold them for a minute. Most of the women in it are over 60.
Well, I didn't know, so I just checked. I did 1 min. 10 sec.
Sound like you have good strength though if you can do 40 sec. X4 !! I'm no expert though!
I am 43 and have never had natural upper body strength, I have been doing the Jillian Michaels and Bob Harper DVD's for the last couple of years 3-4 times per week. I feel like they've helped my strength and overall fitness.
I was doing 60 secs before bed until I got pregnant. I haven't done a plank in a while though. I'd do two sets.
I could probably do a bunch of 30 secs sets right now, but 40 x 4 or 5 sounds great to me!
omg, 15 seconds of misery!
just getting to 30 seems like an impossible goal. i just dont know how people do a minute or more!
khairete
S.
A minute or so. I have been doing Yoga for 10+ years and still try to keep up doing it (at least 15 minutes a day) since having kids. Funny thing I have also been doing pushups everyday since my 2 1/2 year old was born and now I can also do more pushups easier than I could in College and in college I was in ROTC.
a few girls work out during our lunch break at work. the plank is incorporated into 3 days of our workout routine. 2 days a week we go for 1 minute twice during the routine and 1 day day its just a minute during bootcamp. we could go more if we really pushed ourselves but we only have a half hour to workout so we keep it at 1 full minute. Its not easy though!!
uh, if I got down on the floor, I couldn't get up...does that make you feel better? lololololol =)
I have worked myself up to 2 minutes and 45 seconds (happened on Saturday). I do pilates and yoga once a week so that really helps out. Keep at it and try adding in 5 or 10 seconds every week or every month. Before you know it, you'll be doing a minute or two at at time :)
No idea!!
I'm currently back in prep mode. Which means my current goals are:
80 four-count pushups
60 situps in 60 seconds
10 pullups
3 miles in 21 minutes
Relative Flexibility (splits, back walkovers, etc.)
If I can avoid injuring myself... this should take about 3-6 months.
Last time I was doing 80 4CPs... it took something like 10 minutes.
Currently... I don't have even 1 solid pushup.
I'll get back to you.
I was training for a race recently where the training plan started with 3x 10 seconds, but you had to rotate between using one hand (side planks) and both hands. That was a freaking FAIL for me. I can't do the side planks at all.
That said...your question just prompted me to see how long I can hold a regular one and I did get to the one minute mark. I've always heard that it's not upper body strength but your core that determined how long you can hold this. Do you do pilates or upper body exercises? I can't do a real push up but I like to do modified push ups at the gym using the smith machine. My goal is to be able to drop the bar to a lower level every few weeks until I'm close to the actual push up position. It's a great way to build both upper body and core strength in one exercise.
ETA: A. check out the Shape Diva Dash training plan (you'll find it if you google it). If you do weight training, it has awesome ways to mix up your workouts to build core strength as well. I was surprised at how tough some of the exercises were. For example, instead of laying on a bench and doing chest presses with a bar or dumbells, you do them standing up at a cable machine on one leg with rotation so it works your whole body, not just your chest and arms. There is a plank rotation that's really challenging too.
I'm 42. The youngest of my three kids is three. I can plank for a whole minute-maybe longer. I too discovered massive upper body weakness about a year ago (when I started trying planks) along with a 20 pound weight gain from the previous summer :-0 so I've been training all year to balance things out. I lost the weight, increased some weights and yoga upper body stuff, and I gradually built up the plank endurance....but if I'm tired I can't plank as long. After a tough aerobics class etc, I do shorter planks and bicycle etc, not long planks. Hang in there! You'll get stronger! At my age, I do need the tough workouts, weights, running etc too, but you're right, your arms and core will SUCK if that's all you do. Yoga is AWESOME in the mix because it's constant planking and core stuff (but not enough on it's own to burn fat as you get older unless you practice constantly and never eat an ounce of bad food.)
I can probably come close to a minute, when holding myself up with my hands but struggle when using my forearms. When on the reformer & using less resistance, I struggle at 30 seconds. I think you're doing a good job.
I don't know, but now you have me curious and I'm going to time myself. I just can't do it now because I just got back from a weight lifting class in which we did planking at the end. I regularly take that class and a yoga/pilates class so I'm pretty certain I can do a minute, but I don't know about two. That's a long time to plank. I'll let you know! And, do you mean on feet or knees? There's a big difference. I assume you mean from the feet, but in my classes people can plank from their knees if they can't do it from their feet.
1 minute x 3. By the end of the third minute, my whole body is shaking.
I can do plank jacks...does that count? :)
