Pre Selection 18th March

[Dragonskin]

I've got pre selection coming up very soon and I'm still not up to scratch yet but I was wandering if it was permissible to rest during the 2 min push up test? I can bang out about 20-ish before my shoulders start hurting and my head feels peculiar but a 20 second rest usually sorts it out and I can continue.

I'm not exactly in poor shape (for a civvy) since I can do 70+ sit ups in 2 mins its just I really REALLY struggle with push ups for some particular reason. I am trying to resolve this situation by adding front dumbell raises to my exercise sets to strengthen my shoulders but 2 and a half weeks is not exactly going to help much is it now?

I'd be grateful for any answers given,

Thanks.

[jimmyingram-iow]

when i did selection for royal marines, i'm pretty sure you could rest so long as you stayed in the press up position. if you just stop then that is counted as you cant do any more. guessing it will be the same for the army?

[charnock1990]

yeah you can kneel up n have a rest, but make sure you push yourself as hard as you can! dont give up!

[Raven]

You might not be getting resistance to increase your muscle size and therefore increase the amount of push ups you can achieve.

You could try doing your push ups with a back pack on with a few heavy books in or a couple of kilos (2 or 3kgs) of weights and then build up to your 20 push ups again.when you have achieved 20 push ups with the back pack on try your next set without the pack and see what you can achieve, it should be a marked improvement. ( you should leave a 48hour recovery period between the pushups, so you should be able to increase your push ups before the march 18 selection )

If you need to improve more try the back pack again with more weight and build up to your max again.

[nel]

If I was you(and I was when I started I could only do 22) I would start off with the 100 press-up program, get used to your bodyweight as it is at the moment. I then moved on to doing 8 sets of 25 reps every two days e.g. 25 press-ups then straight away 50 sit-ups then 25 press-ups etc. You get to rest your arms while you do the sit-ups. Also I never put my knees on the floor, this even when your arms are fecked will force you to get used to your body weight under duress. Obviously gauge what for yourself is pushing it rather than hurting. I then went onto the method when I reached 52 press-ups in the 2 mins to 31 press-ups 3 sets but I did the first set and rested for exactly 1 min, then copied etc. At the moment I am doing a full body workout with free weights and when I do my bicep curls I then straight away do 20 press-ups, I do this for three sets aswell. I'll get back to you to tell you if this has helped to improve at a latter date. Also just a quick question, how does wearing a backpack help?

Good luck.