When you do pushups, what percent of your total body weight are you lifting up, for instance, if you were doing the bench press, how much would you be benching when you do one pushup?

Gnomon

If you do pushups properly, you are lifting just half of your body weight. Oct 08 02, 11:03 PM

Fosse4

My maths isn't up to it but you can work it out using the 'Rules of Levers' (think it's the third rule where the fulcrum is at the end of the lever) - you'll need to know how much of your weight is actually being lifted (ie-remove the weight of your arms and the size/weight of your head will have to be taken into account as it's above the lifting point of the lever. My guess is between a quarter and a third - there's not many people who can straight lift half their body weight. Oct 09 02, 8:00 PM

Gnomon

If your head did not stick out beyond your shoulders and your weight was evenly distributed along your body and your arms weighed nothing, it would be exactly 50%. Because the weight would be exactly evenly divided between your hands and feet. Because your head sticks out a bit, this adds to the difficulty. Because you're only lifting your arms about half the distance of the rest of your body on average, this lessens the difficuly a bit. That's why I said it is a half. Oct 09 02, 9:41 PM