I did it! I followed the Pushup Chart and made it to the 45-pushup line. That last 45 was hard though, I can’t deny, and I didn’t do all 45 straight through, I had to pause at 35, then 40, then on to 45 to the goal. Even with the stops, I did it within a couple of minutes, so I think that’s a win.
So where does a budding superhero go from here? Well, my thought was to take a rest day, then back off to tackle 40 reps without stopping. That rest day was actually yesterday, then I began a climb up the hill again today. Had to stop at 35 again today… perhaps it’s a mental block? Maybe just simple fatigue? Who knows? It did seem like a blasted through 40 a little quicker, though.
I’ll keep the rep-rest-rep cycle going until 40 reps without stopping is the norm, then keep going to 45 reps, then on to 50. At 50 reps (a nice round number to appease my engineering sensibilities) I’m going to stop there for a while and grind away as a sculpting exercise, trying to trim up from just the sheer effort.