If you do not feel the exercise working your chest but your arms, does that mean my chest is stronger than my arms and i need to work on them? or my arm position is wrong and i need to widen? i don’t go to the gym and i haven’t got a bench so i’m using press ups and dips for my chest at the moment (i’m saving up for a squat rack/bench and a set of cast iron free weights for lifting in future)
Thanks!
Or perhaps your arms are weak? Arm position is not important as you should be doing a variety of pushups. There are many variations from hand position to body position and using angles to stimulate other muscle fibers. Don’t worry about it as much as making sure your form is correct and your not half-assing with ass up in the air pushups. Don’t sell yourself short.
Aim for doing 100 pushups a day then 200. The first 100 being whichever you can do the most and the next 100 being 10-20 reps of variations. If you can already do 100 pushups per set you should already have an idea of other types of pushups you want to do.
Keep doing the push-ups; don’t go for working on the arms alone to strengthen them. If you’re right and your arms are weak, the push-ups will make them stronger. It won’t take long to even everything out. Also, remember the mind-muscle connection. While you’re doing your push-ups, or whatever muscle you’re working, concentrate really hard on that muscle - feel it working.
Place your hands out wider.
Just like a bench press, wider = more pec, closer = more tri action.
There literaly could be over a hundred reasons why you feel the exercise more in you arms than chest. You can try widening your hand position when you push, you can pause at the bottom position for a determined amount of time, or you can just keep pushing. I don’t think you are heading for any trouble or anything, just keep it going as hard as possible.
Can you flex your pecs yet? If so, after doing as many pushups as you can, try flexing ur pecs. If it hurts, you worked them.
Seriously, i feel them in my arms too, i just widen my grip. Then i feel them more in the chest.
i feel push ups in my arms as well and i feel i have an underdeveloped chest… i usually dont know if i worked my chest until the next day because of the soreness… only on days that i do giant sets do i feel the pump in my chest… that is just how my body works and in my opinion could be how your body works… but as most have said just widen your grip so you focus more on the pecs than the arms…
park
To increase target muscle work, mentally focus on contracting the actual muscle in question while performing the exercise.
Picture yourself on your chest muscle, and although you’re levitating your body with your arms, put the focus on contracting your chest during the motion.
Focus on pushing your body away from the floor with your chest, not your arms.
(Note: apply the above technique also to your many other exercises, such as pull ups, etc).