How do you assess your body health?

sijomial

frankwbrown wrote: »

sijomial wrote: »

Respectfullly....

Think you have confused BodPod and hydrostatic body composition testing - BodPod uses no water, it bounces air pressure waves off you in a sealed "egg". Hydrostatic is a dunk tank, immersion in water.
I had a series of BodPod tests and the first three were perfectly believable but the fourth was very obviously wrong in numbers and trend. More like a silver standard than a gold standard and perhaps of more use to a sports club rather than to an individual paying for testing? Overall not as useful for my trending as a 4 point BIA device where at least I could test frequently and discard obviously suspect data.
Personal experience is that self-administered few site calliper testing and tape measurement methods (such as Navy Method) have given me very dodgy and sometimes silly results. Multi-site calliper testing by a trained operative is pretty good though, not sure if aging skin / loss of elasticity is taken into account though?

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My health and fitness monitoring:
Very rare for me to be ill which is a decent indicator of my immune system.
I weigh daily and stay in a good weight range.
Mirror tells me all I need to know about body fat percentage at maintenance. I maintain at a range where small changes in composition are very visible. This year of lockdowns and gym closures have been reflected in losing and regaining muscle definition and separation.
Occasionally test my blood pressure as not problematic for me.
Had a batch of blood tests in this my 60th year to establish a baseline for periodic testing - results were nearly all good to optimal.

For cycling I regularly test my FTP and casually watch a VO2 max indicator. Strava segment PRs show performance improvements for my cycling. During a hard training block I monitor my resting HR as a fitness and recovery indicator. Times for 100km and 100mile rides are a good test of speed endurance.
For strength I go by my numbers in a few key compound lifts. I first bench pressed 100kg 42 years ago and that's a reliable sign my overall strength is in a good place.

Thank you for correcting me. I am aware of the two different methods, but only knew the name of BodPod. I should have looked up their proper names: hydrostatic weighing (HW), and air displacement plethysmography (ADP).

Does your BIA scale support wi-fi or bluetooth, enabling one to easily access the readings for importing data (even if only via cut&paste) into apps like MyFitnessPal, Garmin Connect, FitBit, Google Fit, etc? I wouldn't mind having a 4 point BIA scale.

Swimming is my preferred activity, but after that is cycling. But I am nowhere near your kind of riding. I would like to be able to track FTP and VO2max, and I'd love to be able to afford a power meter for that purpose. But I recently purchased a Garmin Fenix 6x, and that's as extravagant as I can be.

I'd love to have a go at hydrostatic testing - purely because my one (totally useless) superpower is to sit comfortably on the bottom of a swimming pool despite not being very lean.
My Omron 4-point scale didn't have any connectivity. I have free use of an internet connected commercial standard Boditrax unit at my gym but the downside is that it makes it harder to test under consistent conditions which is important for BIA estimates/trending. When I've used 2 point devices they have only been good for a chuckle!

Power meters for cycling strip away a lot of the mystery but can bring you down to earth with a bump if you compare yourself to others.
A combined proper VO2 max test and max HR test in a sports lab is fascinating but incredibly tough if you are self-competitive so I'm happy just to track a rough indicator.

frankwbrown

manderson27 wrote: »

Am I breathing? Check
Can I get out of bed. Check
Am I in minimal pain. Check

I am good to go.

I had no idea it could be that simple!

frankwbrown

sijomial wrote: »

I'd love to have a go at hydrostatic testing - purely because my one (totally useless) superpower is to sit comfortably on the bottom of a swimming pool despite not being very lean.

I don't have that problem... yet.

sijomial wrote: »

My Omron 4-point scale didn't have any connectivity. I have free use of an internet connected commercial standard Boditrax unit at my gym but the downside is that it makes it harder to test under consistent conditions which is important for BIA estimates/trending. When I've used 2 point devices they have only been good for a chuckle!

That's too bad. I'd love to have a 4-point device but I've gotta have access to that data. My gym recently acquired a 4 point BIA device but I've yet to use it, because they just closed again. And as you say, the readings vary enough already with the most consistent conditions I can manage each morning at home.

sijomial wrote: »

Power meters for cycling strip away a lot of the mystery but can bring you down to earth with a bump if you compare yourself to others.
A combined proper VO2 max test and max HR test in a sports lab is fascinating but incredibly tough if you are self-competitive so I'm happy just to track a rough indicator.

I don't dare compare myself to others. I've already become painfully aware of how far "back in the pack" I am when it comes to cycling. I'm on my own journey and the only person I'm looking to best is my old self.

AnnPT77

Hmm. Complicated question, worthwhile to mull over IMO.

First, how I feel: Energy; mood; perceived mental clarity including memory; routine pain/discomfort levels **; recovery after exercise; improvement gain-rate from exercise; relative difficult of routine home/yard work at the margin (digging holes, toting heavy bags of mulch or whatever, wheelbarrowing, and that sort of thing), etc. (** At my age & stage, there's usually at least a trivial amount of pain/discomfort somewhere, and I have lots of experience assessing whether it feels better/worse from a similar stimulating event(s) at different times. Ditto with expectations about exercise recovery and gains, I understand my baselines pretty well.) Also, nutritional metrics are a high priority, specifically whether I'm meeting my specific calorie, macro, and veggie-fruit servings goals the overwhelming majority of days. Similar thing, though informally, for goals to be regularly active.

Second, incidence of any health issues whatsoever, including minor ones: Basically, things I think others have mentioned about not getting colds; how my body heals cuts or bruises; how baseline health conditions I have (hypothyroidism, arthritis, etc.) are playing out; leading indicators like hair loss or brittle nails; etc.

Third, basic medical screenings: Blood test results, blood pressure, etc.

Fourth, exercise and performance results: Resting heart rate, heart rate recovery to baseline after exercise, "cost" of pace in terms of heart rate metrics, raw peak paces (when I can force myself to peak effort😆); strength results (when I bother) in terms of both one-rep volume and endurance. The Garmin VO2max estimates and "fitness age" estimates are kind of in the same category as BIA estimates, amusing but not persuasive.

I track my weight, and what my BIA scale says, but I don't put much stock in them as standalones. Obviously, I care if my weight suddenly starts increasing noticeably, but at this point, controlling the process (intake, activity) is a bigger focus: If I'm staying active and eating right, the scale will mostly follow. Also, I do care a little about body composition, but mainly for functional reasons, so I pay more attention to the functional indicators than any body comp metrics. I've considered sports-lab testing just for fun, but I'm not sure I want to work that hard either. 😉

frankwbrown

AnnPT77 wrote: »

Hmm. Complicated question, worthwhile to mull over IMO.

First, how I feel: Energy; mood; perceived mental clarity including memory; routine pain/discomfort levels **; recovery after exercise; improvement gain-rate from exercise; relative difficult of routine home/yard work at the margin (digging holes, toting heavy bags of mulch or whatever, wheelbarrowing, and that sort of thing), etc. (** At my age & stage, there's usually at least a trivial amount of pain/discomfort somewhere, and I have lots of experience assessing whether it feels better/worse from a similar stimulating event(s) at different times. Ditto with expectations about exercise recovery and gains, I understand my baselines pretty well.) Also, nutritional metrics are a high priority, specifically whether I'm meeting my specific calorie, macro, and veggie-fruit servings goals the overwhelming majority of days. Similar thing, though informally, for goals to be regularly active.

Second, incidence of any health issues whatsoever, including minor ones: Basically, things I think others have mentioned about not getting colds; how my body heals cuts or bruises; how baseline health conditions I have (hypothyroidism, arthritis, etc.) are playing out; leading indicators like hair loss or brittle nails; etc.

Third, basic medical screenings: Blood test results, blood pressure, etc.

Fourth, exercise and performance results: Resting heart rate, heart rate recovery to baseline after exercise, "cost" of pace in terms of heart rate metrics, raw peak paces (when I can force myself to peak effort😆); strength results (when I bother) in terms of both one-rep volume and endurance. The Garmin VO2max estimates and "fitness age" estimates are kind of in the same category as BIA estimates, amusing but not persuasive.

I track my weight, and what my BIA scale says, but I don't put much stock in them as standalones. Obviously, I care if my weight suddenly starts increasing noticeably, but at this point, controlling the process (intake, activity) is a bigger focus: If I'm staying active and eating right, the scale will mostly follow. Also, I do care a little about body composition, but mainly for functional reasons, so I pay more attention to the functional indicators than any body comp metrics. I've considered sports-lab testing just for fun, but I'm not sure I want to work that hard either. 😉

That all seems very sensible.

I have no doubt that once I am fit (he says, optimistically), I will be less concerned with body comp metrics and focused more on functional reasons. But at this point in my journey, body comp metrics satisfies my "need to know".

ninerbuff

For me:

Am I in pain?
How's my movement?
How do my joints feel?
How do I look in the mirror?


That's it. For real.

A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

Robin_Bin

I think you forgot 2 very important measures...
1) How do you feel?
2) Can you do basic things without hurting of feeling out of breath? These would vary by person, but can you
* climb a floor of stairs and talk at the same time?
* walk a mile on easy territory (like sidewalks or smooth paths)
* go grocery shopping (or some other walking and standing activity with light carrying)
* cook a meal or clean up (20 minutes of kitchen or laundry work) without needing to sit down for a break
Make your own list of a level of activity that seems reasonable. Over time it may change. (For instance when my arm was in a cast, simply getting dressed in the morning was hard - although my general health was ok at the time. Putting on knee socks one handed can be very difficult!)