BOB weight vs human weight

I am sure this has been asked before...

My hiking backpack/BOB weights ~26 pounds.

I am 5'10" 200# and well built. Let's say I cut down to 180#. Could I then add 20# to my bag and not feel it? I mean I am already carrying around this 'extra' weight.

Someone explain this to me.

It's been a long long time since I did much hiking, but I didn't see any answers yet so here's my pass at it.

If you are well built now and lose 20 lbs, be careful that you are not losing muscle. If you are losing fat, be careful that you are not shorting yourself an energy reserve you need to keep warm and moving.

That said, your lifting exertion would be about the same for picking the pack plus your body up, but I would suspect that how much you feel the relative weight of the pack depends more on the pack and where it places the load on you. 20 lbs centered nicely over your hips should be doable. 20 lbs. added to a pack that is comfortable at 26 lbs but does not correctly carry that 46 lbs would be miserable.

Doing work at the gym, if I match my old big-me weight by picking up iron, it's a lot harder to move around than when I was an out of shape marshmallow. My legs can push and lift harder now, so that part's OK. But weight outside the body pulls more on your control muscles, and if you have to carry or stabilize it by hand, moreso.

TLDR: Try it and see what you get, but don't hurt yourself over it.

No. You will still feel it, and it will still feel like 20 additional pounds.

Your ability to carry weight depends more on your fitness than your weight.

this.

i lost 60lbs ill be damned if that means i add 60 extra to my 35lb ruck

At any weight, whether we're talking about you or your pack, there's no absolute point where things change. It's not like a light switch.

First off, there are a lot of variables. Mental state, age, fitness level, terrain, weather, even the style of backpack can make a substantial difference. There's also the factor of how long, how fast, and how steady.

You might be able to carry 50 lbs for 25 miles on a flat walk on a mild day. But torch up the temps, bring on some steep inclines, and see what happens. That 25 miles turns into 15, and you'll be ingesting a lot more water.

But knock it down to 35 lbs, and while it won't make much difference to the flat walk, (weight is a much bigger issue going up and down hills as it works your body a lot harder, not only exertion-wise, but also the pounding on your skeletal system) it will make a huge difference on your hilly walk. And while you may not need to hike 20 miles a day, there's still the issue of staying alert and having enough energy to react to threats. More weight means more walking like you're in a trance, and if suddenly challenged, your reaction times and speed will be a lot slower.

So the bottom line is; lighter is better. Everyone has to make a personal decision where that line is. The best way to find out is to go use it. Push yourself to find out what you're capable of doing, but also refine your gear list so you're not carrying a bunch of crap you don't need and will never use. So when I say use it, I don't mean strap your pack on and go walk a mile to your girlfriend's house on a sunny Spring Sunday. I mean go out in the rain, the snow, the heat, and hike for several days. A couple weeks if you can manage it. You'll discover things about yourself and your gear that you'll never learn from reading someone else's gear list on an internet forum.

Az

Thanks for all the info guys.

You will carry as much as you train with, no more (long term).
Most people can carry 40-60 lbs short term 2-10 miles, and often have an injury because of it.
In a true bug out the last person to leave the area will need a friggin dump truck to pick up all the gear people have removed from there packs to reduce weight.

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