Check out this great article from Greg Everett at Catalyst Athletics:
The Push-up: Why Is This So Hard?
A lot of that should sound familiar from previous posts and my harping in class…
Why should you care about doing a perfect push-up? This is self-defense training after all, not competitive fitness. The push-up is a fundamental exercise used in our training. If done correctly, it trains not only “arm strength” (which will benefit your combatives), but the ability to maintain a rigid core (which benefits everything you do in and outside of class). If knowing that an improper push-up can cause more harm than good doesn’t drive you to improve your form, maybe this will:
Ugly push-ups offend me deeply 馃槬
Nice push-ups last night, gang! I knew you could do it if we made you!
[Evil laughter]