check this dude out...must put a lot of strain on the lower back though. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjgCZ3HF3Qk"]Handstand Push-ups Freestanding (15) - YouTube[/ame]
Physiologically, doing push ups with your feet raised will put more strain on the anterior delts and upper chest than it will on the lower. Raising your hands rather than feet will recruit more lower pectoral fibres. It is the same for everybody, it's simple physiology. 20 years of lifting experience makes no difference here, it's just fact. It will work the entire pec major but more strain will be concentrated in those areas.
Hiroji Thats amazing, It would be extremely difficult to have a straight handstand and do them, the more curved the spine is the easier to balance, but as you say its bad for the back.
This is correct. It's basic sense. Elevating your feet during a press-up is the equivalent position to an incline bench. Elevating your upper body is the equivalent to a decline bench. This is obvious; when you're benching, your chest faces up and when you're pressing, it faces down, so the angles only make sense.
I though I post this question in this thread rather than making a new one. Is there a push up that works the inner chest preferably the upper inner.
I don't believe so. You can't work the "inner chest", the fibers of your pectoralis major muscle span laterally across your chest from the proximal insertion point near your sternum to the distal insertion on your humerus, or upper arm bone. What this means is that you can't stimulate the muscle near one insertion point and not the other; when your pecs fire, the fibers contract along the entire length of the muscle. There are different insertion points along the clavicular head, which creates the upper/lower pec division, but it doesn't work the same way laterally. If you're looking for definition of your chest in the "upper inner" portion of your chest, then you simply need to hypertrophy your chest muscles and achieve a low body fat percentage.
Sorry but I couldn't completely understand your post. I think you're tring to say that you can't work a particular spot on your chest. But surely some pushups work the inner chest more than the outer, say?
Sorry Verx, I was trying to save time because usually when I simply tell someone "It doesn't work that way" they always want to know why, and they usually tell me how their personal trainer or some yup at their local gym told them that you can do such and such. So rather than say "You can't" then when you say "why not?" have to explain it with another post, I said "You can't, because blah blah". Concise is good, but not always convincing unfortunately.
Don't apologise, I got the jest of your post and it makes sense. You also seem well informed about muscles and human atonomy.
G-bells, you're wrong about the decline bench press = decline push-ups. It doesn't matter how long you've been training: you're wrong. Decline has many meanings (decline push-ups doesn't mean your strength declines for example! ) and a decline from one angle is an incline from another. Put your legs up. Get in the push-up position. Hold it. Before you even move you notice strain on the top of your chest. There is no debate. OP, as already said: narrow push-ups work your triceps and shoulders, wide ones work your chest. Feet elevated - top of chest. Upper-body elevated - bottom of chest (though for some reason I find kneeling push-ups do more for me). Also try irregular span push-ups (they probably have a cool name in a different, cooler universe...! In fact I seem to remember seeing 'Spiderman push-ups' somewhere for these) where you place your hands at different levels to start with (ie one level with your nipples, and one down at your waist. Also try scapula push-ups. A lot of regular push-ups and especially the narrower ones are bad for the connective shoulder tissue and rotator cuffs. Scapula push-ups will work those smaller muscles. These consist of starting in the upper push-up position and, keeping your arms straight, lowering and raising your upper back between your shoulder blades. Hurts but it's good for you. BTW I've also heard hindu push-ups are hell on your rotator cuffs.
Regular pushups are great for your shoulders actually, because they allow your scapulae to freely move and stabalize, unlike the bench press where they're locked in place. However, scapula pushups are great and they hit the serratus anterior, which is a very weak and imbalanced muscle for most people, and thus it lends itself to weak shoulder stabalization and the potential for injury.
You could always look at the description two posts before yours in the last paragraph...! You know, if the vid's not good enough for you...
