Added On November 6, 2011
Why You Won't Gain Muscle From Push-ups Even If You Can Do 100
by Rusi
I would bet a lot of money that at least one of every 2 boys has at some point of his life wanted to be able to perform 100 push-ups in order to gain muscle. But guess what, being able to do 100 push-ups won't make you that much muscular.
In order to gain muscular bodyweight you need to get stronger at the right rep range which is 6-10 for upper body movements and 6-15 for lower body. You can argue about this numbers but they will be right for most people. When you can do more than this you are training muscular endurance. When you can do 100 push-ups you are doing cardio rather than hypertrophy training.
That's why many young boys are disappointed after they reach a magic number like 100 push-ups and they still have a small chest. You have to find a way to challenge yourself and reach failure in the specific hypertrophy rep range. There are many ways to add resistance to your push-ups - rings, weight vest, chains...use your imagination and work hard.
Muscle growth is an adaptation to stress. You have to stress your body really hard over and over again in order to grow. For example if you walk for 2 hours you may be tired but the stress to the body is entirely different than a set of heavy squats for example. The volume is high but the intensity of the exercise is so low that you develop endurance rather than strength.
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