Man did push-ups and added one to the total everyday to see the impact it would have on his body
I don’t know about you but when I see there’s push-ups listed on my workout, I feel a tear mixing with the sweat on my face.
But YouTuber Cedrik Flipo decided to out-do all us strugglers, as he got through a mammoth amount over a year.
Back in 2022, the French-Canadian athlete took on the challenge of adding one extra push-up for every day that passed to see what impact it would have.
He explained: “I started a push-up challenge on 31 January, 2022 - doing one push-up and adding one for every day that passes by."
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A runner, Flipo put his body and physical fitness to the test as his physique soon changed during the challenge.
Rather than just your arms, doing a push-up engages your body from the top to the bottom as your chest, core, hips and legs are also put to work.
Personal trainer and physical therapist at the Harvard-affiliated Spaulding Rehabilitation, Vijay A Daryanani, explained to Harvard Health that the key to performing a good push-up is 'proper execution and form'.
"Where you can feel your muscles fully engaged, is what's important," he said. "It's always better to do five good push-ups than 10 bad ones."
What effect did the push-up challenge have on Cedrik's body?
There was a clear difference in Flipo's body following the six months he had spent completing the exercise daily, with an ever-increasing amount to tick off.
He shared his results with his 13,900 YouTube subscribers on 20 June and apparently only skipped one day due to a shoulder injury, so if he's telling the truth, he was doing 140 push-ups a day by this point.
Yep, it doesn't bear thinking about.
He said: "This was my physique before I started doing push-ups and not even halfway through this challenge, you could already see I gained a lot of upper body mass.
"If you're looking to get bigger and gain muscle, I would definitely recommend this challenge as it's not very long and it's also very efficient."
Flipo didn't specify what other workouts he'd also been completing during this time period, but we can at least assume he was still getting his steps in and running a lot.
Still, social media users were gobsmacked by his results and hundreds of people flooded the comment section of his post with praise.
One said: "This proves perseverance is the key."
Another wrote: "I did that for about 3 months and the change was crazy."
What are the risks of doing more than 100 push-ups daily?
Health and wellbeing website Endomondo has warned there are some risks to going this crazy on push-ups.
For one thing, while you'll have a properly ripped upper body, unless you're working out your lower body to the same extent, it can lead to an imbalance. Ideally, you should also be resting for one to three days after very strenuous exercise, allowing your muscles to recover and build back stronger.
You're also more likely to develop overuse injuries with these kind of challenges - such as pain and inflammation in the chest, shoulders, elbows and wrists.
It can also be difficult to build strength progression with push-ups, since you're only lifting your own body weight, plus doing the same exercise so often can be boring and make your goals harder to achieve.
How many push-ups should you be able to do in a row?
Men's Health US fitness director Ebenezer Samuel said we should all be able to do 20 to 25 press-ups in a row at some point in our lives.
Harvard scientists, meanwhile, have a slightly higher target. They say men who can do 40 or more push-ups in a row were 96 percent less likely to experience a heart attack or stroke than people who can only do 10.
Jess Battison