The last few months have been frustrating physically for me. I injured my back a long time ago (December 2009). After doing physical therapy at 3 different places, getting an epidural shot, and working with a few different trainers, I’m still pretty clueless as to what to do. I have an aggravated nerve in my lower back that flares up during a number of activities, most notably while sitting and after working out. Well, I sit all day at work (although I recently acquired a standing desk, which helps). Because of all this sitting, my back stays in pain for several days after I work out most typically. Anyways, I don’t want to go on about that too much other than to say that I’ve been frustrated with it. I haven’t been able to work out and as such, I’ve been losing muscle mass and weight. I don’t like losing.

I recently started tracking in a spreadsheet all of the activities that I do in a day and pairing those with a 1-10 scale of pain for the day. I’m hoping I can determine the most damaging activities and avoid those, while still remaining as active as possible. This finally brings me to the point of this post: I need something to work towards physically, and I need that activity to not aggravate my back too much. Near as I can figure, push-ups don’t hurt too much.

I’m hereby embarking on an attempt at the 100 push-up program. It’s a program designed to get one to 100 pushups in 7 weeks. I’m not sure that I believe the hype of the program, but it looks like a good starting point to get myself to 100 pushups in a row. I did my test to start off and I got 41 in a row to start, so I’m starting off on week 3 of the program. I’ll be modifying as needed to include more rest and some cycling, but consider this game on.

Who’s with me? If you want in, do the initial test and post your score in the comment and what week you’re starting on.