How many lbs should an adult male 5'9 120 lbs be able to bench press without any lifting experience at all?

[Anonymous]

[WindAtMyBack]

There are a lot of variables here. First, are you talking about a machine or free weights?

Another variable is your body type. With the same strength, someone with a shorter bone structure should be able to lift more than someone with a longer bone structure.

Anyway, lifting your own body weight is a good semi-random number to throw out there. How many good push ups can you do? You are using mostly the same muscles as benching at approximately 70% of your body weight.

From a practical point of view, the muscles you use to do bench presses are not as useful as some other exercises. That's true of most weight lifting, but benching probably more than others.

[In_Trance]

. You can lift what you can lift and everyone is different. With the numbers you put in your initial question there's not a lot of mass there. You probably want to start somewhere around 50% of your body weight.

[jahaims]

A male should be able to bench at least his own body weight

[Anonymous]

Supposedly a guy is supposed to be able to lift his own body weight.