Wrist pain from simple Push-Ups?

[johnnq1]

I've been getting pain in my wrists from my daily push-ups. It feels like there is a wring of pain around each wrist as if I had a tight bracelet on the very end of my forearm. I'm only doing my body weight with my hands a tad over a shoulder's width apart. The pain isn't terrible but I don't think I should be getting any pain from push-ups.

I do roughly a few sets of 30 push-ups but I've never felt anything up until a few weeks ago. What's going on??

 

[Kaido]

1, are you overweight?

2, try doing them on your fists - so your wrists are straight down, not bent.

 

[xboxist]

Try them on your fists (use a tshirt or a towel between your knuckles and the floor if needed), or try using push-up stands.

But yes, wrist pain can result from the standard push-up form.

 

[imported_Imp]

How long have you been doing push-ups?

I remember when I first started, my wrists also hurt, especially after doing 2 or more sets. I managed to alleviate the problem by doing doing wrist curls with dumbells, and easing off on the push-ups.

The worst thing you can do is push through the pain early on. You have to give it time to heal and build strength, so when it hurts, back off a few days.

 

[SociallyChallenged]

Some people have a more limited wrist range of motion than others so regular pushups actually aggravate their wrists. You can alleviate this problem by doing fist pushups as suggested earlier in the thread. This strengthens the wrist while minimizing any possibility for injury.

 

[irishScott]

I reccomend push-up bars. Can be found for cheap, take the pressure off the wrist, and give you more elevation/makes for a more difficult workout. If you want to strengthen your wrist there are other, safer exercises (ie: using gripmasters)

 

[StageLeft]

Common problem.

 

[SlitheryDee]

If you just started doing pushups, a little (or even a lot) wrist pain is to be expected. During the normal course of events people rarely position their hands at such a flat angle with any force behind them. The muscles and tendons will be sore until they stretch to accommodate the new stress. I had similar problems when I added pushups to my routine and then again when I started doing front squats. Each time the pain went away when my wrists became limber enough to do the exercises.