How Fast should you do Pushups?

Pushups are one of the most beneficial and diverse exercises you can include in your workouts, but before you reap the rewards of this amazing exercise, you came across a source of confusion. And now you’re wondering if you should do your pushups fast or if you should do them slow.

I understand the source of your confusion. On one side of the internet, you’ll see some guys pumping out seemingly hundreds of them in a minute. On the other side, you’ll see some guys going so slow that you swear they’re barely doing any exercise at all.

Here are the reasons why you should your push ups fast or slow, so you’ll know what benefits you are going to get out of them and know just how fast you should do your pushups.

The Mechanics behind a Pushup

Before we talk about why pushup speed matters, we need to understand the basic mechanics behind the pushup.

The Muscles Involved in a Pushup

Although we may like to think that the pushup is a chest exercise, it is actually a full body movement. The pushup works:

• The Chest Muscles- Pectoralis Major, Pectoralis Minor, Serratus Anterior
• The Shoulder or Deltoid Muscles
• The Arm Muscles- Biceps and Triceps
• The Back Muscles- Latissimus dorsi, Trapezius, Rhomboids
• The Core Muscles- Abdominal muscles and Spinal erectors
• The Leg and Glute Muscles

All of these muscles are either involved directly in the movement or help stabilize the joints throughout the body during a pushup. This makes it a perfect exercise for building muscle.

How to do a Pushup?

In order for you to perform a pushup:

1. Get down on all fours.
2. Bend your arms at the elbows so that your chest is lowered to just above the floor.
3. Contract your chest and triceps muscles so that you lift your chest off the floor and back into the starting position.

The Mechanics

It is a simple movement, but all of the muscles in the body must be active in order to keep the straight body needed for proper form. We can see that this movement can be divided into 4 phases:

1. An Eccentric or Lengthening phase- this is the part where you’re lowering your chest and the muscles are lengthening.
2. A Concentric or Shortening phase- this is the part where your muscles are shortening and you are pushing up off the floor.
3. 2 Isometric phases- here the muscle is neither shortening or lengthening. This is the pause at the bottom and the top of a pushup.

It is important to note that the muscles are actively contracting during all of these phases, but the force of contraction will vary based on the speed you are performing the pushup.

Now that we understand the basic mechanics of a pushup, we can now discuss the effect varying pushup speeds can have on your workout and body.

Fast Pushups

The average time it takes to perform a regular pushup is around 1.5 seconds. However, fast pushups, like the name suggests, are performed in a much quicker time, usually under 1 second per repetition.

What are the Benefits of Fast Pushups?

1. Fast Pushups increase Speed

This is an obvious result and it’s simple to understand. If you do pushups fast you’ll be able more in a certain period of time, and with more and more speed training you will be able to do them faster and faster.

However, this benefit is not isolated to just the pushup alone, because if you train the muscles involved in the pushup to contract faster then this will carryover to all activities involving these muscles. Research has also shown that if you train a muscle to contract slowly, then its speed will be reduced.

So for athletes, like boxers, the ability to use those muscles quickly can mean the difference between a win or a concussion. Therefore fast pushups should find a place in any athletic program.

2. Fast Pushups increase Muscle Power

Power is based on force and velocity. If you are able to produce a greater force of contraction and perform that contraction in a shorter period of time, then you will produce a more powerful muscle contraction. Doing the exercise quickly will train your muscles to generate a lot of power during the concentric phase of muscle contraction.

This means that doing fast pushups will improve athletic performance, improving everything from punching power to how fast and far you can throw a ball.

3. Fast Pushups stimulate Fast Twitch Muscle fibers

Type II fast twitch muscle fibers are those muscle fibers needed to produce large forces and generate a lot of power. These are the larger muscle fibers so they are the main reason we train with heavy weights in the gym.

Because heavy weights require a large force to move, they will stimulate the larger muscle fibers, leading to more muscle growth. Therefore, by doing pushups faster we can help stimulate more of these muscle fibers, making it essential for any muscle building training program.

4. Fast Pushups help you do more Repetitions

If you are doing your pushups faster then you will be able to perform more repetitions per unit time. This is beneficial if your goal is to be able to perform as much reps as possible in a minute.

Additionally, fast pushups reduce the time period for the eccentric phase of the muscle contraction. This phase produces more muscular damage which leads to fatigue. Therefore, your muscles will get tired a lot less sooner when doing them faster, leading to more repetitions being done overall.

5. Fast Pushups improve Cardiovascular Health

Performing pushups faster makes it similar to a cardiovascular exercise, because in order to go fast enough your heart and lungs need to work harder in order to meet the demands of your muscles. This causes them to grow stronger to adapt to your training.

What are the Disadvantages of Fast Pushups?

1. Fast Pushups increase the risk of Injury

Doing any exercise faster can cause you to neglect form, especially because when you’re performing higher repetitions the lactic acid burn in your muscles and your heavy breathing will distract your focus.

Even if you can focus on your form while you are moving so fast, the chances of injury is also increased because of the increased power you are generating. This power has to be transmitted to all of your joints and tendons and can damage them especially if your form is off.

2. Fast Pushups produce less Muscle and Strength development

This isn’t to say they don’t develop muscle. Rather, if your main goal is to build as much muscle as possible, then fast pushups will give you suboptimal results. Learn how to use pushups to build muscle and strength here.

This is because most of muscle growth occurs during the eccentric phase of the pushup, where the muscle is lengthening under tension. During this phase the muscle is slightly damaged producing microtears, so when it recovers from this damage it recovers bigger and stronger.

Performing pushups faster reduces the time the muscle is under tension during the eccentric phase, leading to less muscle growth and strength development in the long term.

Slow Pushups

When compared to a regular pushup which is performed in around 1.5 seconds, a slow pushup is generally performed in over 3 seconds.

What are the Advantages of Slow Pushups?

1. Slow Pushups increase Muscle Size and Strength

Because slow pushups extend the time period the muscle is under tension during the eccentric phase of the exercise, it leads to more muscle damage and microtears. The muscle responds to the increased time under tension by increasing the number of contractile units, also known as muscle fibers.

Additionally, when the muscle recovers from the damage, caused by the exercise, it recovers bigger and stronger. Therefore, slow pushups are more beneficial for those prioritizing upper body strength and muscle growth.

2. Slow Pushups reduce the risk of Injury

Because your repetitions are so slow, you are really able to focus on performing them with correct form. Additionally, the reduced power generated does not put as much stress on the joints as fast pushups do. Therefore, there is a reduced risk of injury when doing pushups slower.

What are the Disadvantages of Slow Pushups?

1. Slow Pushups don’t increase Muscle Power and Speed

Because you are training the muscle to contract slowly, you will reduce its ability to produce large amounts of power. This is because if you train a muscle to contract slowly it will get slower. This will negatively affect athletic performance.

2. Slow Pushups reduce Repetition count

Slower repetitions increase the time the muscle is under tension, leading to more muscular damage which fatigues it faster. Because you are tired faster, slow pushups cause you to perform a lower number of total repetitions.

Additionally, because repetitions are done slowly, the total number of pushups done per unit time will be done slowly. Therefore slow pushups are not optimal for those seeking to perform as much pushups as possible. Learn how to do more reps of pushups here.

Should you do Pushups Fast or Slow?

Whether you do your pushups fast or slow is dependent on your goals and what benefits you would like to get out of the exercise. Let’s compare both:

	FAST PUSHUPS	SLOW PUSHUPS
POWER/SPEED	Higher	Lower
MUSCLE SIZE/STRENGTH	Lower	Higher
RISK OF INJURY	Higher	Lower
NUMBER OF REPS	Higher	Lower
CARDIO	Higher	Lower

Both of these have similar benefits, but each speed excels at one benefit over the other. Whether you do your pushups faster of slower depends on who you are and what kind of benefits you want to see more.

Compare whether muscle power or muscle size is more important to you and decide, but I suggest including both fast and slow pushups in your training program to get all of the benefits.

How to get the benefits of both Fast and Slow Pushups?

1. Do Regular Speed Pushups

These pushups are neither fast or slow. They will give you a balance between power and muscle development. However, they do not excel at developing either when compared to doing them slow or fast.

2. Do both Fast and Slow Pushups

You can include fast and slow pushups in one workout or include them in separate workouts to emphasize strength and size on one day and power on another day.

3. Combine Fast and Slow Pushups

All of the power generation benefits of fast pushups come from the concentric phase of the exercise. This is where it recruits fast twitch muscles. However, it isn’t effective for damaging those muscle fibers and causing growth.

In comparison, slow pushups cause muscle damage, due to the extended time of the eccentric phase of muscle contraction. However, they aren’t that effective for stimulating the fast twitch muscle fibers.

Therefore we can combine the benefits of both fast and slow pushups by performing a pushup with varying speeds during the concentric and eccentric phases.

How to do this?

Perform the eccentric or the lowering phase of the pushup slowly and controlled, around 2-3 seconds. Pause at the bottom. However, for the concentric phase of the exercise push up quickly and explosively. This way you recruit the larger muscle fibers and damage them to lead to both, resulting in gains to both muscle power and size.

Now that you know how fast you should do your pushups, here is how you can use them to reach your goals.

References:

Adams, G., Cheng, D., Haddad, F. and Baldwin, K., 2004. Skeletal muscle hypertrophy in response to isometric, lengthening, and shortening training bouts of equivalent duration. Journal of Applied Physiology, 96(5), pp.1613-1618.

Ebben, W., Wurm, B., VanderZanden, T., Spadavecchia, M., Durocher, J., Bickham, C. and Petushek, E., 2011. Kinetic Analysis of Several Variations of Push-Ups. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, 25(10), pp.2891-2894.

VOSSEN, J., KRAMER, J., BURKE, D. and VOSSEN, D., 2000. Comparison of Dynamic Push-Up Training and Plyometric Push-Up Training on Upper-Body Power and Strength. The Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, 14(3), p.248.

Hsiu-Hao Hsu, et al. Effect of Push-up Speed on Upper Extremity Training until Fatigue. (2010). Journal Of Medical And Biological Engineering, 31(4), 289-293.

Paul Pei-Hsi Chou, et al. Effect of Pushup Speed on Elbow Joint Loading. (2010). Journal Of Medical And Biological Engineering, 31(4), 289-293.