digital scale for body fat%

donjtomasco

My question is, if a person completely dehydrates and does not eat any food, may even hit the dry sauna prior to weighing, will the readings be off? And will they consistently be off either way, most possible to reading you have more then less body fat?

I am asking because I am participating in the Gold's Gym challenge, and I am hearing people on FB say that they have strategies to do just these things on the day of the final weigh in, including (men, and men who of over 50) who will be shaving their chest, tanning, and oiling up for the camera.

Full Disclosure, I am not shaving my chest hair, or tanning (I have a day job and can't tan, nor do I think it is a fun idea just to try and look better then I do) and I am NOT oiling up. AND, I am going to use THE CLUBS SCALE on the final day weigh in, which we must use, and I will do it at the same time as when I first weighed in, and I will be hydrated and will have eaten a normal breakfast.

But I am now curious about the digital scale and if it penalizes people for zeroing out on food and water before the weigh in. The gym does NOT use calipers.

And if this is the case, it may help explain how ripped some people look in their after photos who won last year, but oddly seem to have lost not much body fat but lost a *kitten* ton of pounds and in some cases lost a lot of inches, in others did not lose a lot of inches.

Having done this dieting working out daily weighing thing now since January 1, I can see how in one or two days, someone can manufacture a loss of 3-6 pounds just by starving for the final day weigh in. Plus, add in possibly a sandbagger who prior to the day one weigh in, may have for several days eaten pizza pasta and bags of salt then downed a gallon of water before the weigh in. Wow, you could easily add 5-6 pounds on the front end, take off 5-6 on the back end, and man, what a swing.

Not knowing nor caring about how this challenge thing works, I thought it would be a good idea to have not eaten or drink any water the day of my first weigh in. I weighed in for a first day weight of 204. The next morning, I weighed in at 206 and change. lol.

All I care about is that I now have the tools and have lost some weight slowly but surely using CICO, eating healthy and working out with weights and cardio. And that is all that matters to me. However, intellectually and cynically I am quite interested in how some of the final results may show up. Especially since there is a $6,500 first prise at stake (or steak, if I may......) which tells me that some people will do whatever it takes to get the scale to speak their language on the first and final day of the 12 week competition.

donjtomasco

never mind. they are not judging body fat% lost, they are measuring the % of fat that was lost ove 12 weeks.