The humble push-up is the ‘gold standard’ of exercises for getting arms strong, lean and sexy. And the added benefit is they are the BEST exercise in the world to help fight osteoporosis, which will affect over 57 million Americans this year.
To help make post50 Americans understand that osteoporosis is not a natural or inevitable part of aging, the National Osteoporosis Foundation is promoting its new campaign, “Break Free from Osteoporosis” and wants all of us to “get down and do 20” . . . every single day!
As the NOF Ambassador for Bone Health, I’ve joined with AARP (where I write the “Best of Everything After 50” column) to help spread the message about assessing our risk factors and what to do to prevent or slow down osteoporosis. The first four episodes of the new weekly AARP YouTube Channel show–“The Best of Everything” — were completely devoted to strengthening our bones and preventing osteoporosis . . . for life.
Here’s the segment that shows you how to do push-ups the right way:
After turning 50, I took stock of where I was in my life and made a commitment to improve my health and well-being. One of the first things I started to do to strengthen and tone was the push-up, the “gold standard” of upper body exercises. Doing push-ups every day, combined with eating well and running with walk breaks (check out my video about safe running after 50) helped strengthen and tone my body in ways I never thought possible.
If you haven’t done a single push-up since high school, start with the modified push-up and work your way up to the full push-up, as demonstrated in the video. And remember this: how low you go isn’t as important as keeping the right form. Result? You’ll be stronger than ever. And that’s what it’s all about!
Until next time, remember this: We can’t control getting older . . . but . . . we can control how we do it!