Do Push Ups Build Muscle Mass?

Article by Brandon Young

I joined the Marines back in 1999. Prior to joining, I was obsessed with building muscle. I was so obsessed that I lifted weights for two hours a day, six days per week. I thought that joining the military was going to help me gain muscle mass. It was simply not the case. The way we did push ups built muscle, but not the kind of muscle I was hoping to build.

I was pretty naive at the time, and did not know that much about training. I did not realize that there were different muscle fiber types. We were training our type one muscle fibers, which are used for endurance training. Type one fibers have little or no ability to get bigger.

A friend recently asked me, “Do Push Ups Build Muscle Mass?” He knows that I do them on a regular basis and always comments on my muscular body. I really wanted to help the guy, but he was pretty lost when it came to training. When he asked, I had to really think about what I was going to tell him. In the military, I did not build any muscle mass. I actually lost weight. However, I now know more about training and realize that there are ways to modify exercises and make them more suited for mass gain. Although I had never tried the modifications I was going to tell him about, I knew they would work.

I told him that he could if he modified the exercise for building muscle. I told him that to modify them for building muscle, he would need to use extra weight. I told him some methods of adding extra resistance include using harder versions of push ups, such as one hand push ups or diamond push ups, raising his legs onto a table or platform of some kind, buying a weight vest, draping chains over his back, using resistance bands, or loading a book bag with anything he could think of.

My friend was glad to hear that push ups could build muscle. He is a big fan of doing them. In fact, he used to do entirely too many of them. He did them in the morning and at night. After toying around with the new versions I suggested to him, his physique changed quite a bit. So, if someone asks you, “Do Push Ups Build Muscle Mass?”. You can give them the same answer I gave my friend. Yes, doing push ups will build muscle if they are modified for building muscle.