Relative Strength + Bodyweight Exercise Load

Quickstart

Most fitness apps log a pull-up as “1 rep” and stop there. That works for counting. It falls apart when you track progress over a cut or a bulk.

The real load of one pull-up is about your full bodyweight. Your hands on the bar are the pivot, so your whole mass below the bar is what you lift. For a push-up it is about 64% of your bodyweight, since two-thirds of your mass sits above the pivot at your toes.

Gain 5 kg on a bulk and your pull-up load went up. Lose 5 kg on a cut and it went down. Same ten reps, but real different work.

Kinoku tracks the real load, not just the rep count. The rest of this page covers why the numbers matter, which studies they come from, and how to read the Total Load chart to track progress with clear eyes.

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What “relative strength” actually means

You can measure strength two ways:

• Absolute strength: how much weight you can move. A 200 kg deadlift is 200 kg, whatever you weigh.
• Relative strength: how much you can move for your own mass. A 200 kg deadlift at 80 kg bodyweight is a 2.5x pull. At 100 kg bodyweight it is 2.0x.

Both matter. Powerlifters care about the absolute total at a weight class. Gymnasts and calisthenics athletes care about relative strength, since their sport is moving their own body. Most serious lifters care about both at different times.

For bodyweight moves like pull-ups, push-ups, dips, and pistols, relative strength is the whole game. A pull-up at bodyweight is 1.0x. A pull-up with a 20 kg vest is (bodyweight + 20) ÷ bodyweight. Progress is not only more reps. It can be more load at the same reps, cleaner reps at the same load, or a better ratio as your body changes.

Why “reps × 1” is wrong

A typical app logs a pull-up set as exercise=pullup, reps=10. It reads the session as “10 pull-ups” and stops. This breaks in two ways:

1. Volume charts go flat for bodyweight work. Your Monday pull-ups at 75 kg and the same Monday session six months later at 90 kg both log as “10 pull-ups.” So the volume chart shows a flat line. But the heavier session is real more work. The chart lies.

2. PR detection misfires. A “best” on a bodyweight move is just “more reps than last time.” It ignores that you might do those reps at a 5 kg lighter body, which makes them easier, not harder.

Both bugs come from the same root. The app counts reps instead of tracking load.

The load numbers

When you hang from a pull-up bar, your shoulder is the joint that turns to bring your chin up. The mass below that joint, which is most of your body minus your arms and head above the bar, is the real load. Studies on pull-up form put this at about 1.0 x bodyweight for most builds.

For a push-up, the pivot is at your toes. The mass above it, which is most of you, is the load. Published studies (Chulvi-Medrano 2017, Bagchi & Lockhart 2011) land near 0.64 x bodyweight for a flat-plank push-up.

Kinoku ships load numbers for the most common bodyweight moves:

Exercise	Load factor	Notes
Pull-up	1.00	Full bodyweight
Chin-up	1.00	Same factor. Grip shifts muscle use, not load
Dip (parallel bar)	0.98	A touch under bodyweight. Feet hang below the pivot
Push-up (standard)	0.64	Two-thirds of mass sits above the pivot
Pike push-up	0.75	More mass shifts onto the upper body
Decline push-up	0.70	Rough. Depends on the decline angle
Inverted row	0.70	Varies with body angle and foot spot
Pistol squat	0.85	The free leg balances you, so it is not pure load

Odd variants like planche push-ups, one-arm pull-ups, and levers are not shipped, since I would rather not guess. When one is, it comes with a wide margin note.

Adding extra weight

Wear a 10 kg vest on your pull-ups and your real load per rep is bodyweight + 10 kg. The load factor stays the same. You just add weight on top of your own mass.

Hang 30 kg from a belt and it is the same math: bodyweight + 30 kg. The factor still applies to the bodyweight part only, since that is the part it describes.

A push-up with a 10 kg plate on your upper back gets a bit odd. The plate sits above the pivot, so it is mostly all load. But part of it sits closer to your hands than your torso would. Kinoku counts the plate as 1.0x (straight added load) rather than splitting it by physics. The error is too small to matter.

Saving your bodyweight at the set

For the math to hold across a cut or a bulk, Kinoku needs your bodyweight at the time of the set, not today. There are four ways to feed it:

1. Profile setting: the current bodyweight you type in
2. Health Connect: an on-device sync from any weight app
3. Pulse metric opt-in: log weight on the morning Pulse screen
4. Manual backfill: add a weight reading to a set after the fact

The app saves that weight with the set. Sets with no saved weight use a 1.0x stand-in, the way it always worked. They are not re-scored after the fact. This keeps your old log honest. Your 2024 bodyweight work still reads as 2024 bodyweight work. Only sets with a saved weight get the more exact tracking.

Reading the Total Load chart

The exercise detail screen for any bodyweight move shows two charts:

1. Volume chart (the usual kind): sets times reps over time
2. Total Load chart: per-rep kilograms over time, using your bodyweight and the load factor

Flip the relative strength toggle and the Total Load chart switches to load ÷ bodyweight. Now you can see progress apart from any body-weight change. This is the view competitive calisthenics athletes use.

For planning, the two charts answer different questions:

• “Am I getting stronger overall?” → Total Load chart
• “Am I getting better at moving my body?” → Relative strength view

Both are fair questions. Your goal sets which one matters more.

The “Gravity Defier” achievement

Kinoku marks relative-strength milestones with a three-tier achievement:

• Bronze: 1.0x bodyweight on any bodyweight move (a clean bodyweight pull-up)
• Silver: 1.5x bodyweight (your body plus 50% added load)
• Gold: 2.0x bodyweight

These sit in the STRENGTH category. They do not care about rep count. One clean rep at the target ratio unlocks the tier.

Why I chose this approach

There were a few options:

1. Ignore bodyweight, like most apps: simpler, but the volume chart lies
2. Fixed load numbers with no saved weight: less exact across a cut or a bulk
3. Per-person numbers from muscle or motion sensors: more exact, but it needs gear most people will never set up

Kinoku uses published load numbers plus a saved bodyweight. It is the sensible middle. Most people get far better tracking than before. Anyone who wants exact-to-the-percent numbers for their own build can read the source studies.

The idea is plain. Track the work you actually did, not the work the app guessed because guessing was easier.

Track this in Kinoku

The Bodyweight Total Load feature runs this across your whole training history. The exercise detail screen shows both the absolute and the relative-strength view. Pull-ups, push-ups, dips, inverted rows, and common variants all use shipped load numbers. Odd moves use 1.0x with a note, so you can choose whether to change it.

References