Non-rotating push up handles review

Push ups are without doubt a great body weight exercise, they are also highly under-rated. Push ups build strength in a lot of muscle groups, can be done almost anywhere, at almost any time, you don’t need to get changed and drive to the gym, you don’t need any equipment, you can do as few as you need to, you can do variations to focus on certain muscles or to increase their intensity, the list goes on and on.

I am amazed at how this relatively simple exercise is so often overlooked by people trying to get stronger. A few year ago I started doing a one hundred push ups per day for thirty day challenge, and it changed my life. After the first 30 day challenge I have been doing back to back 30 day exercise challenges and haven’t missed a day in over 2 years. You can read more about it here.

About a year or so into my challenges I wanted to get push up handles. I had seen rotating push up handles, and while they look great I can’t justify the expense. I had also seen non-rotating push up handles, and push up stations, which ranged in price from about $6 to about $160. I bought the cheapest ones I could find.  

After using push up handles for about a year, as well as doing push ups without the handles during this time, I thought I would tell of my experiences, as well as my thoughts about buying them.

To be clear, I have never used the fancy rotating push up handles so cannot comment on them. They look pretty amazing, but I don’t know how long they last before breaking, or if they offer any benefit over non-rotating push up handles. If you want a blog post on those you can give me some to use for a year, or you can write a guest blog post.

Push up handles

While push ups are free, the handles did cost money. I spent about $8 for a pair. They are metal and have squishy things on the handles which make them nicer to hold. After using these for over a year they look much the same as the day I bought them, so I expect them to last a long time.

Advantages of non-rotating push up handles

Push up handles allow for a greater range of motion and I can get deeper if I want to. I can get lower and work right to the end of my muscles. They can also be good for stretches.

My left wrist can be a little temperamental, this is the result of an old injury and is mostly an issue in cold weather or if rain is coming. The push up handles keep my wrists at the proper angle, and seems to reduce/eliminate pain. To be clear, wrist pain is usually caused by improper technique. If you are having wrist pain from push ups you need to do something about it or you risk injuring yourself.

They protect my hands if I am doing push ups outside on gravel or concrete. This sounds silly, but sometimes if the weather is nice the kids and I do many push ups and variations outside. I was originally stopping from scratching my hands, now I can do more sets.

Probably the most impressive advantage I have noticed, is that I can do other exercises with them that I am unable to do without them. I can do elbow lever, and bent arm planche using push up handles, but I am unable to do these exercises without them. I am training to do various other things, using the handles is the first step, once I am stronger I plan to be able to do these exercises without the handles.

Disadvantages of non-rotating push up handles

The biggest disadvantage is I may not always have the push up handles with me. I can always do push ups without them, so this isn’t a huge issue.

While mine were cheap, they did cost money. While they are small and simple to store, they are one more thing that I now own.

Other than that I can’t think of any disadvantageous to the push up handles.

Other types of push up handles

There are various different places that make non-rotating push up bars, from what I can tell they all do the same thing. Some cost vastly more than others, some look prettier, I think that mostly has to do with their brand rather than being able to add anything. If I had tools and was a little handy I would make my own from scraps.

As mentioned I have no views on the rotating push up handles because I am yet to use them. They may be great, they may be utterly dreadful, I don’t know.

I have seen “push up stations” which are push up bars with a colourful mat. The mat shows you different spots to place your handles for different exercises and to focus on different muscles. I think this is a bad idea. I use those different configurations but I don’t need an expensive mat to show me what to do. Perhaps your arms are longer or shorter than the person that these mats were designed for, in that case this mat will enforce you holding your bars at the incorrect spacing for your body and putting yourself at risk of injury. I would avoid these stations as they appear to be an expensive gimmick over function.

Cheap push up handles

My verdict

Do I like push up handles: Yes

Do I need push up handles: No

Which brand is best: It doesn't matter because they all do much the same thing

Are they worth the money: Yes for the cheaper ones. No, not even remotely worth the money for the more expensive types

My 12 Yr Old is Stronger Than You

I normally don't put any photos of my kids on the internet.  I hope that this will be ok as you can't really see their faces well enough to identify them and put them in danger.

My twelve year old son is stronger than most adults I know, and he is getting stronger every day.  He can do thing that most adults in this country have never done and will never be able to do.  

My son has been skinny since he was a baby.  He will likely never bulk up.  Yet he is stronger and more capable than most adults in Australia.  He loves exercise, and loves strength training, and will never be overweight or obese as he gets older because being strong and fit has been normalised for him.  What a great start to life.

He thinks nothing of his strength and ability because even though he is skinny he has always been strong.  He has true strength.

An old swing set being used to train for back lever

Benches are good for strength training

You can train for strength almost anywhere

Not many adults would even try this!

Ignore the mess, this is impressive for a 12 year old

As well as some of his more impressive feats of strength, he also trains for endurance, balance, and capability.  He is skinnier than most kids his age, yet he is vastly more capable than most kids his age.  I am very proud of him.

One of the things I love about training with my kids is that they think because they are young and thin that everyone is stronger than them and can easily do what they can do.  They are humble.  They have no concept that few adults can achieve this, and very few children their age are fit and strong enough to attempt such things.  

They are happy to do what they can, and don't get upset when they try something new and fail.  If they don't fail, then they will never push themselves further.  If they have no fear of failure, then they won't push too far and risk injuring themselves.  When they succeed, they are glad, and then they start to think of what the next challenge can be.  Exercise and strength training is fun to them.

Ever since he was tiny he could balance and hold up his body weight.  This has paved the way for more difficult body weight exercises.

He has been doing this for years

Prochnost training - strength, balance, and control

Push up handles coming in handy

I hope seeing my twelve year old doing these impressive things will inspire someone to do a little strength training.  Don't try to do better than someone else, you should aim to improve yourself.  Be more!

We have push up handles, monkey bars, and an old swing set that I let my son use when I am there to supervise.  Sometimes we train together, sometimes we don't.  I won't let him use my free weights or dumbbells as they are not great for growing bones if not done properly.  Body weight exercise is much safer.

Other than that he does push ups and other bodyweight exercises that require no equipment, and look at what he can achieve.  This is a twelve year old who is incredibly thin, if you put in some effort perhaps some day you can be as strong as my 12 year old son!

Do some strength training, be more.

Human Flag for skinny people

If you are skinny fat and building strength, one of the biggest hurdles you will face sill be motivation.  Even if you gain muscle and strength you will never bulk up, which makes it really difficult to stay motivated.

One of the greatest builders of motivation is doing something that most people can not do.  Another of the great motivation builders is to do something that looks really impressive.  The "human flag" is one such exercise that ticks both of these boxes.

When I was in my twenties I used to be able to do the human flag, it was easy enough and I thought everyone could do it.  Now that I am older, and weaker, I tried to do the human flag again and found it impossible to do.  It was so hard that I wondered if I would ever be able to do this again. 

I did a little research, and it appears that very few people can achieve human flag, and most who can are incredibly athletic monsters.  I had no idea, I used to think if someone skinny like me can do it then everyone could do it.  Turns out I was wrong.  

The fact that very few people can do this made me really want to do human flag again.  It is impressive to see an athletic person do this, it is mind boggling to see a scrawny bloke like me do it.  This made me want to train and do this again.  We got a set of monkey bars for the kids a few years ago, so I have somewhere to train without having to leave my yard.

I did some more research, and most of these athletic monsters trained for hours each day, for between six months to two years before they could achieve this.  Hmmm, I don't have hours each day to train, and I didn't want to wait two years to be able to do this again.  

I set a timeframe of six weeks to achieve this, and got stuck into training.  I only trained for a few minutes every day because I didn't have much spare time.  I just made sure to train every day.  Every single day.  No excuses.

Human flag - a bit wobbly and my feet are too low but I was getting there

Most people assume that lack of core strength is what stops them from being able to do human flag, but most people have enough core strength.  Most people lack the upper body/arm strength required for human flag.

I have been doing a lot of push ups so thought I had the upper body strength to pull this off, and I thought that I lacked the necessary core strength.  I was partly right.  

I lacked upper body strength AND I lacked core strength.  I also lacked leg strength for some reason.

This was going to be tricky when I don't have more than a few minutes each day to train.  My six week timeframe to achieve this was starting to feel overly optimistic... 

To increase my core strength I started to do side plank dips.  I used straight arms so my shoulders and arms would be in a similar position to where they would be in the human flag.  Doing a few of these each day, every day, and I built core strength pretty quickly.

Straight arm side dip planks helped tremendously, but my legs and my arms were still too weak.

I was already doing a lot of push ups, and I started doing chin ups each day.  I was only able to do five chin ups at the start.  After a few weeks was able to do ten and eventually got up to about twenty in one set.  I need to write a blog post on how to increase the number of chin ups, because it is different to building numbers of something like push ups.  I am told that you need to be able to do 10 chin ups with proper form to have enough strength to do human flag.  I am not sure if this is true or not but getting stronger upper body has to help.

Chin ups helped build my shoulder strength and bicep strength, but I also needed more triceps strength.  It is absurd how much your triceps are used in human flag.

I started to do diamond push ups.  These hurt my triceps a lot, so were clearly making them stronger.  Together with regular push ups and chin ups my arms gained the strength that was needed to do human flag.

Strangely enough my legs were also weak.  I have some leg weights from back when I used to do kung fu.  I put them on for a few hours each evening after work.  I even tried to do the human flag while wearing my leg weights and tried to do some chin ups while wearing the leg weights.  This made my legs strong enough to do human flag.  Chances are your legs are already strong enough, I am not sure why my legs are so weak, but they were weak so I made them stronger.

As well as all of that, I also got in and tried to do the human flag every day.  We have monkey bars for the kids so I would go down after work each day and quickly give it a go on each side.  As I got stronger I got closer and closer to being able to successfully pull off this exercise.  Sometimes I could hold it for 1 or 2 seconds.  

My aim was 3 seconds, which felt like a lot more than I was capable of.  I had set my timeframe and had to achieve it, so I kept training.

Human flag training - almost there!

After five weeks of training, I was almost there!  This video shows how close I was:

A few days later I successfully did the human flag!

It took me a little under six weeks of daily training, but I was eventually able to do the human flag on the pole of a street sign in front of some strangers.  

I overheard comments that were seemingly in awe.  I couldn't quite hear what they were saying as I was struggling not to pass out at the time.  Someone far larger than me and rather athletic looking saw what I did and then tried to do the human flag, he failed miserably, he couldn't even get his feet off the ground.  That's what I was after.  

If I can do this in just under six weeks, then you can do it too!  Don't feel bad when you first try and fail.  Without failure there can be no progress.  Try to remember that many (untrained) larger and more athletic people have also tried this and they have failed.  The difference between failure and success is training.

If you are skinny you should train to do the human flag. 

There is something nice about being able to complete an impressive exercise that few people can do.  There is something even nicer when people twice your size give it a go are unable to do it.

Do prochnost strength training, try harder, be more!

My 10 Yr Old is Stronger than You

My kids are incredibly strong.  They can do things that many adults have never been able to do.  My kids are also skinny, which makes their strength more impressive.  

I normally don't put any photos of my kids on the internet.  I hope that this will be ok as you can't really see their faces well enough to identify them and put them in too much danger.  I also don't show details such as birth dates or names on the internet.  

My ten year old daughter can do things that most adults in this country have never done and will never achieve.  The best part is she has no idea how strong she is, she humbly assumes that everyone can do things like this.  

True strength is light as a feather

One of the great things about my kids is that they are happy to get in and give things a go.  As long as I am there encouraging them then they are happy.  I tend to be shy, more self conscious, and reluctant to train out where people can see me.  

My daughter can do elbow lever, and sometimes on a good day she can do a bent arm planche.  She is happy to do a little bit of street training when we are out for a walk.

People see my kids doing these amazing feats of strength and endurance, and often some of the more athletic men will give it a try as they don't want to be out done by a child.  So far I have never seen one of them succeed.  

There is something about a large muscly man being out done by a ten year old that brings a smile to my face.  There is something about a humble ten year old who honestly assumes that everyone can also do this that makes me proud.

I sometimes see other people tell their kids to do this too.  Most of their kids are larger and stronger looking than my kids, but they have not trained, so they also fail.  I have no doubt that other kids could do this kind of strength exercise if they were trained.  I trained my kids, so think I could train theirs too.  

Instead of training or playing outside, their kids tend to sit around and play computer all day, so they will likely never be able to do things such as this.  Given the cost of being overweight to this country, it is too bad that more kids don't get outside and play and do a little strength training like this.

There is something I like about park bench training

Playgrounds are good for strength training - but scary

This was scary as the end of the pole is broken and sharp!

Impressive strength for a ten year old

Hopefully seeing a ten year old doing impressive feats of strength will help to inspire someone to do some strength training.  

The best time to start strength training is when you were young.  The next best time to do strength training is now.  Get in and give it a go.  Don't worry if you can't do it, don't worry that your progress is slow, just try.

Do some strength training, be more!

Healthy BMI for skinny people

I  have always been thin and have never had extra weight to lose.  My healthy weight hovers around the healthy/underweight line on Body Mass Index (BMI) charts.  For me to get into the middle of the healthy range I would actually be really unhealthy.

At some stages I have been ‘skinny fat’ (where I look skinny but carry extra fat around my organs), other stages I have just been ‘skinny’ (not much fat, not much muscle), and other stages I have been ‘thin and strong’.  

I am reaching a stage in my life where my metabolism is slowing, I am gaining some impressive old man strength, and I now carry a little body fat (far less than most men my age).  I am still thin, but I am strong for my age.

A while ago I lost a lot of weight rather quickly.  It was not intentional and it worried me.  I wasn’t eating differently, I wasn’t exercising differently, and I didn’t know why I was quickly losing weight.  Then I gained back some weight, I lost that and then lost some more in a very short time frame.  This worried me so I went to the GP and was told not to worry, it was probably due to stress.  I asked for a blood test, which didn’t show anything that could have caused this fluctuation in weight.  From here my weight kept yo-yoing rather sharply, and I stayed a bit under my normal healthy weight. 

My weight slowly went down until it reached a worrying low, then it slowly increased for quite some time.  All of this was with the same food and exercise as before.  Eventually my weight levelled off and remained reasonably stable. 

Earlier this year I went to hospital for the first time in my life.  At that time my weight was above the green line on the BMI chart meaning that I was within the ‘healthy’ BMI range.  I wasn’t far above the line, but I was above it nonetheless.

Image with permission from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ABmi-chart_colored.gif

While in hospital I was asked by numerous nurses and doctors if I have an eating disorder, and I was watched carefully at meal times to see what I was eating.  The first few times I was feeling too poorly to think much of it.  As I started to feel better and I kept being asked, and it started to irritate me.  I was in the ‘healthy’ BMI range, and people were asking if I have an eating disorder and not trusting me when I said no, that seemed odd. 

I wondered if everyone is asked if they have an eating disorder.  I decided to find out. 

I asked some of the other patients who were in the ‘overweight’ BMI range if they had ever been asked if they had an eating disorder.  I also asked some of other patients who were in the ‘obese’ BMI range the same question.  I was always careful in my wording, and they usually got a laugh when I told them why I was asking.  Their responses surprised me. 

None of the people in the ‘overweight’ BMI range had ever been asked, while only some of the people in the ‘obese’ range on the BMI chart had ever been asked if they had an eating disorder.  I was in the ‘healthy’ range and was being asked several times per day! 

It still gets under my skin that they question someone in the ‘healthy’ BMI range if they have an eating disorder, but no one ever asks anyone who is at the upper end of the ‘healthy’ range, or anyone who is in the ‘overweight’ range, it is only once people are within the 'obese' range that they are asked. 

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) says about 67% of adults in Australia were overweight or obese (36% were overweight but not obese, and 31% were obese).  Under one third (31.7%) were within the healthy weight range and about one percent (1.3%) were underweight.  Even though I am thin enough to be asked repeatedly if I have an eating disorder I am one of the people in the healthy weight range.

If you are reading this and are considering telling me that I could gain weight if I ‘just eat more’, please don’t bother.  When I was younger, if I ate high fat and high sugar my metabolism would increase and I would lose weight.  If I exercised more I would gain weight (muscle) and if I lazed around I would lose weight as my muscles atrophied.  If I gain weight by eating more I gain fat around my organs, which is rather dangerous.  The only way I can gain weight in a healthy way is to gain muscle.  Providing advice when you have little concept of genetics or metabolism will do more harm than good.  Besides, if you went around telling overweight people that they would lose weight if they ‘just eat less’ you would probably lose your voice before the end of the day.

Obesity, and to a lesser extent being overweight, increases the risk factors behind many diseases and is often associated with more severe outcomes of many injuries and diseases. 

According to the ABS, over one thousand people die annually in Australia from obesity related causes.  The World Health Organisation states about 2.8 million people die annually worldwide from obesity.  According to TheWorldCounts.com obesity kills 4.72 million people annually, which is about 8% of global deaths.  I’m not sure which statistic is correct, and I don't really care because they are both far too high.

Image with permission from https://renewbariatrics.com/australia-obesity-statistics/

If 2/3 of our country are overweight or obese, and being overweight causes health issues, and the estimated cost to the country runs into the billions, and obesity rates are increasing, then we have an issue with people who are overfat.  

The crazy thing is, our medical system and our society in general is so desensitized to seeing overweight and obese people they don’t think anything of it until they get very large.  Whereas a person who is at the lower end of the ‘healthy’ scale is treated with constant suspicion.  

Not surprisingly, given the number of people who are overweight and the health issues that can be exacerbated in people who carry extra weight (as well as the monetary cost to society), most health advice offered is aimed at people losing weight.  Very little advice is aimed at people with low weight who are trying to be healthy, and most of that advice is entirely wrong.  

Once I realised this, I changed the way I exercised, and everything changed. 

I don't really care about my weight, and I don't worry too much about my diet.  If I do exercise it is with the intention to gain strength and ability.  I now doing prochnost’ strength training, and ignore all the nonsense that I hear about training to bulk up and/or lose weight.  I also ignore the often contradictory advice given to skinny fat people to cut or bulk first.  The best part is I am stronger now than I have been in well over a decade.  

I wish I knew about prochnost’ strength training back when I was in my early 20’s, I would have trained better, achieved far better results, and not felt inadequate due to being strong but underweight. 

If you are skinny fat stop feeling inadequate.  Get stronger.  While you may never bulk up don't worry, train for strength, not size.  Do some 2 minutes per day exercise challenges.  Pretty soon you can be stronger than people twice your size!