Body fat measurement-taping vs. little hand held machine :)

Dvija

I generally tend to avoid the whole body fat measuring thing and just focus on my diet and exercise. One of the reasons for this is due to a very unpleasant reading I got from one of the small, handheld measuring machines at the gym. One of the personal trainers at my gym was curious about what my level was, had me hold the machine and it read 40% bodyfat. I found that hard to believe, was rather discouraged and upset for a few days, and then dismissed the whole thing and continued doing my routine. The other day I ran across a way to measure bodyfat with a formula garnered from body measurments. The taping method gave me a bodyfat of 28% BIG difference between that and 40%. How accurate/inaccurate are those hand held devices? How accurate/inaccurate is the taping method? Thanks for any info!

JustJennie1

It's fine if you are using it as a guide only. I have gotten the caliper measurements done and it's based on your AGE. I watched the girl do the calculation, found my age and then came up with the percentage. It was obviously lower if I were younger.mi did the hand held gizmo and that wasn't accurate either as I played with it and it's weight based, not taking into account the fact that while I might weigh more I am also muscular. The only true measurement is (I don't know the technical term) but it's the one where they measure you in water.

Use it as a guide but don't let it freak you out.

Also make sure you have the same person do your subsequent measurements for more accuracy because different people have different ways of doing them.

Dvija

Yep. I'm familiar with the hydrostatic measurement I think it is. I'm definitely just using it as a guide. I was jus tcurious how accurate a guide one might be compared to another. I am actually large framed (according to my doctor) so I know i'm going to weigh more anyway.