I have been doing a bunch on reading on the net about push ups and such to get toned arms, a lot of people say to do so many a day, but other people say that you need to let your muscles rest so they can heal, so do them once a week. Any expert health fitness people on here that can tell me how many times I should do push ups a week? or anyone know any really good web sites for this stuff?

 

i do 30 pushups, then on the last pushup hold it an inch over the ground for 15 seconds like 3 or 4 times a day, every day, and i've noticed it works your pectorals more than anything.

 

I do curls one day, bench press the next. I exercise one muscle group a day and the other the next so they get a day to rest.

 

Really the human body is designed to heal what it needs to overnight for most things. So just do a normal workout everyday and you will start to tone up. Now if you are trying to pack on a bunch of new muscle then you need to rest for a day between workouts. Its all about what you goal is. Do you want to just tone what you have or do you want to build new and bigger. You will need to change the weight adn reps to match each goal as well. PM me if you have any questions.

 

Push ups are more for your chest (mainly pectorals like Flip noticed) than arms. If you wanna tone your arms lift weights.If you don't have access to a trainer the best advice I can give you is to do longer sets at lower weights to tone. Do like 3 or 4 sets of 10-15 reps at lower weights instead of reps of like 4-8 at high weights. As for what weight to go at you can only really find that out yourself, by the end of each set you should be struggling to lift the weight tho. Should be especially hard for the last set.

 

im a "bodybuilding" freak. If you want to gain muscle, doing pushups every day is WRONG! get a gym membership.

Sunday - chest, shoulders, abs
monday - off
tuesday - back, biceps, abs
wednesday - off
Thursday - triceps, abs
Friday - legs
Saturday - off

workouts shouldnt be longer than 45 mins or else the body will go catabolic and thats not counter productive. for example: chest, do 4 different exercises, 3-4 sets each exercise, 8-12 reps each set, 1:30-2:00 rest between sets.

 

Ok, ya I'm not trying to build muscle really, I just want to get more toned. Thanks for the responses, I think I'm going to join a gym.

 

ok if you just want to tone, eat minimal carohydrates 5 hours before bed, make sure you are getting at least 1 gram of protein per pound of body weight, and instead of 8-12 reps, do 15-20 reps for everything I just said

 

u have to pace urself and work out different muscles each day. start with lighter weights and work ur way up slowly. since ur going for toned, go with much lighter weights than ur max and do a high amount of repitions.

should work legs one day. squats, running(also cardio so thats great), leg curls, any leg exercises.
do pull exercises the next. bicep curls, lateral pull-downs, anything that pretty much involves pulling weight towards u.
do push exercises the next. tricep push-down, bench press, shoulder press, chest flys, anything that involves pushing weight away from u.
crunches till fatigue everyday if u'd like.

this will allow time for ur muscles to fully recover(takes 24hrs) and will allow for a well rounded work-out. free weights are the best, machines limit which muscles u use. try a week on a machine bench press and then go to free weight bench, u'll feel different mucles working and it'll be much harder, which is better.

i actually learned something in high school weight training class

 

even just the pushups makes a noticable difference, at the very least do that and you'll notice a difference for sure.