What % of your bodyweight do you lift in a push up?

cunnins4

My brother asked me this last night and I haven't a clue. Google gives wildly varying answers, as low as 30% to as high as 70%. I would've guessed about 40%?

uprooted shane

suppose it depends on your hand position! like i know at the minute im doing training to do planch push ups, and theres a exercise where you have your hands at your waist for them and there really hard!

Will Heffernan

cunnins4 wrote: »

My brother asked me this last night and I haven't a clue. Google gives wildly varying answers, as low as 30% to as high as 70%. I would've guessed about 40%?

Do a push up on set of scales.

NotMe

Well... I'm 75kg. When I assume the push-up position with my hands on the scales it measures 50kg (67%) and when I lower my chest to the ground it measures 57kg (76%). Take from that what you will. I guess it varies depending on the size and shape of the person.

BossArky

I just tried it with a scales at bodyweight 76kg.

Top of Push Up Reading = 51kg (67%)
Bottom of Push Up Reading = 58kg (hands under mid abs) (76%)
Bottom of Push Up Reading = 55kg (hands under nipple line) (72%)

... so based on my measurements and NotMe's we can assume a rough estimation of one press up = 70% bodyweight.

Hanley

BossArky wrote: »

I just tried it with a scales at bodyweight 76kg.

Top of Push Up Reading = 51kg (67%)
Bottom of Push Up Reading = 58kg (hands under mid abs) (76%)
Bottom of Push Up Reading = 55kg (hands under nipple line) (72%)

... so based on my measurements and NotMe's we can assume a rough estimation of one press up = 70% bodyweight.

That is very clever. I'll do it now and report back with my findings in a minute.

Hanley

Bodyweight: 103kg
Top of push up: 70kg (68%)
Bottom (hands under nipple line): 77kg (74%)

So for me, one press up =70% of bodyweight too.

amazingemmet

Shouldn't the reading on the scales be the amount of weight being supported by your feet so what ever is left is going through the hands ie if you weigh 100kg, put your feet on the scales in a press up postion and it reads 70kg then it means 30kg is being supported by your hands. Is that making sense?

Mikel

No, you put your hands on the scales, the reading shows how hard you have to push to raise yourself. The % of bodyweight will depend on the angle your body is at, elevate your feet and you'll see a higher reading.
Handstand push ups will be 100% obv

BossArky

amazingemmet wrote: »

Shouldn't the reading on the scales be the amount of weight being supported by your feet so what ever is left is going through the hands ie if you weigh 100kg, put your feet on the scales in a press up postion and it reads 70kg then it means 30kg is being supported by your hands. Is that making sense?

It's the same thing anyway, just a slightly different method. I prefer the hands on scale version as I don't have eyes in the soles of my feet :pac:

justsomebloke

truthfully who cares though, if a standard pushup it is to easy just make it harder, either by raising you feet to increase the amount of your bodyweight you are supporting or just add weight

Roper

I have two Engineers who train with me and between them I'm sure one of them has come up with an answer to this. Sure one of them one night compared doing the plank to the stress on a bridge. Said he could probably do the math on each of us too to see what percentage of our weight was being supported by our core. It sounded interesting but it also sounded like he was lookinf for an excuse to feel me up so I declined.

Anyway, the higher your feet go, the more weight will be on your hands (obviously) until you're in the handstand position when it will be 100% of your bodyweight. Think I might grab the scales this evening and progressively raise my feet doing them, take some measurements, draw it on some graph paper, tie it to a frisbie, and fling it over a rainbow.

paddyc

It sounded interesting but it also sounded like he was lookinf for an excuse to feel me up so I declined

roper you got a number fro that lad?

Roper

paddyc wrote: »

roper you got a number fro that lad?

Nah, just picked him up on the side of the road.

cunnins4

roper wrote:

I have two Engineers who train with me and between them I'm sure one of them has come up with an answer to this. Sure one of them one night compared doing the plank to the stress on a bridge. Said he could probably do the math on each of us too to see what percentage of our weight was being supported by our core. It sounded interesting but it also sounded like he was lookinf for an excuse to feel me up so I declined.

Both myself and my brother are engineers, and i'm the structural engineer!(well, nearly finished studying!) :o The scales should've been obvious although we don't have one in our house!

70% seems to be the answer so. Cheers guys.

paddyc

Nah, just picked him up on the side of the road.

hope you were wearin a groin guard....

cowzerp

With hands on a scales that would be very narrow and put a lot of the weight forward, you would need 2 scales with 1 for each hand! this would be as close to accurate as you'd get imo! probably about 40-50% i'd say!

Hanley

cowzerp wrote: »

With hands on a scales that would be very narrow and put a lot of the weight forward, you would need 2 scales with 1 for each hand! this would be as close to accurate as you'd get imo! probably about 40-50% i'd say!

That's true. It did feel like my elbows were about to exlpode in the bottom position.

Roper

Hanley wrote: »

That's true. It did feel like my elbows were about to exlpode in the bottom position.

Stop whining cos you've got girly elbows.

bwardrop

From 'Science and Practice of Strength Training' by Zatsiorsky and Kraemer:

% body weight supported by the hands in various body positions:

Hands elevated 122cm (48inches) - about 10%
Hands elevated 92cm (36inches) - about 20%
Hands elevated 61cm (24inches) - about 37%
Hands elevated 31cm (12inches) - about 55%
With your hands and feet on the ground - about 65%
Feet elevated 31cm - 71%
Feet elevated 61cm - 73%
Feet elevated 92cm - 75%
Feet elevated 122cm - 77%

Not sure how they measured it, but the 'hands on the scales' method wasn't too far off!!

BossArky

Regardless of whether it is 60 or 70%, it is more than I was expecting. I would have guesstimated about 40% - 50% before this little experiment.

I think I'll do more push ups from now on.

davyjose

Mikel wrote: »

No, you put your hands on the scales, the reading shows how hard you have to push to raise yourself.

Minus the weight of your arms ... No?

cunnins4

BossArky wrote: »

I think I'll do more push ups from now on.

+1!

Phaetonman

I saw a guy in the gym the other day with a 15 or 20KG plate on his back doing pushups. Just what I need for when I'm away from the gym.

rubadub

cunnins4 wrote: »

Both myself and my brother are engineers,

Mechanical engineer here, this stuff interests me a lot. At ~75kg I was getting 52kg at the top and 58kg at the bottom. This makes sense, people will raise their legs to make pushups harder, in the bottom position your legs are parallel to your head, i.e. your legs are raised relative to the high position.

Even sticking your hands on the scale will make things a tiny bit easier.

Earlier today I did some warmup benching before dips, I did 15reps of 48kg and was finding it hard at that rep range. Now I am sure I could do 50 pushups right now easier, I have done 75 on a good day. I can do about 25 full bodyweight dips. Now bodyweight exercises seem to suit me better but I do think that much, especially if trying to compare pushups with benching. With benching I expect you use more stabilising muscles, a pushup is more like pushing a machine weight fixed in one way of travel, no need to steady the floor on pushups;) This is a point, there are pushup devices with revolving handles, it is harder to do them. Also I do pushups on free moving gymnastic rings which are far harder, you can mix flyes into the movement on rings too, really good ROM.

Stabilising is difficult, a member here was saying he could do 35 dips on a dipstand but struggled to do any on free moving gymnastics rings, he could just hold himself in a steady position on the rings for 30+ seconds.

Position means a lot, a while ago I tried inclined ones on a scale and the weight difference was not that much, but they are much harder, working the shoulders more.

Another use for the scale is doing one arm chinups, stand and pull yourself up, then read the scale and see how much more you need to lift just to start.

I am going to try weighted pushups in the coming weeks and will see how I get on.

amazingemmet wrote: »

Shouldn't the reading on the scales be the amount of weight being supported by your feet so what ever is left is going through the hands ie if you weigh 100kg, put your feet on the scales in a press up postion and it reads 70kg then it means 30kg is being supported by your hands. Is that making sense?

Spot on, and what most forget in calculations, this is why you should not compare them directly with freeweight exercises. I can do 6 chins with 25kg on a belt, so that is 100kg including bodyweight. I can probably barbell curl 45-50kg for the same reps.

If you want to compare bench with pressups it would be interesting to get average peoples ability and make you your own figure/factor/%, it may not be linear at all. e.g. when I started training I could do maybe 3 miserable pushups, they have shot if you just count numbers compared to other exercises.

Hanley wrote: »

That's true. It did feel like my elbows were about to exlpode in the bottom position.

You would be using a close hand position if on a bathroom scales, these are much harder, and I expect you are far more used to a wide grip.

BrianD3

Before I got my bench I did a lot of weighted pushups, IIRC I worked up to doing them with around 45 kg on my person in various way. It was very awkward though I might have 5 kg in my pockets, 10 kg of ankle weights strapped around my waist and a 25 kg plate on my back. Obviously the further forward the weight the better. I would also elevate my hands and feet, my hands would be on push up stands perched on top of stacks of phonebooks. The whole thing was receipe for disaster. But I reckoned that I had very roughly the equivalent of a 90+ kg bench press but when I actually started bench pressing I was nowhere near 90 kg. There just wasn't very much carryover.

Reyman

Phaetonman wrote: »

I saw a guy in the gym the other day with a 15 or 20KG plate on his back doing pushups. Just what I need for when I'm away from the gym.

Don't get too impressed by that! There was a girl in my gym last month running off sets of push ups with 20 Kg on her upper back - no bother.

Never seen the like of it before !