Body Fat Percent Issues

pigote

I've lost 54 pounds since I started here and I thought I was where I needed to be, normal weight range and BMI of 22.2 but my body fat percent is at 31 which shows up as a caution flag. I've never had a tiny waist but I have lost 4 inches since I started but it's still at 30" which puts my waist/hip ratio at .83 and I guess it's supposed to be under .8 for women. Any suggestions? I sure don't see any way to lose 2 more inches from my waist without losing more pounds, which I don't think I want or need to do.
Help anyone?

mallen404

do you work out?

inches are easy to lose by lighting weights

No_Finish_Line

yea, to lose more inches you would have to loose more fat.

if you and your doctor are comfortable where you are now then i guess your set, try to maintain.

the waist to hip ratio is easy to measure correctly (tho i don't know how much it means about your over all health) but the BF% is very difficult to get right and is up to 4% off the real number even if a professional did it.

How did you measure body fat?

pigote

Yes, I do workout. Mostly cardio (treadmill, walking and DVD's about 5 days a week)
I have a few dumb bells 3-15# and a bowflex machine at homew . . . Guess I need to add weight and/or resistance to my program?

As far as the Body Fat % . . . I see now that there are many online calculators. I just found the Military one on Fat2Fit and it says I'm 26.6% based on age, height, weight, neck/waist/hip measurements. I'll pay less attention to that number since I see how fluid it can be without medical testing.

Thanks for the wake-up on that % number
'

CorvusCorax77

I go to every BF% thread and say this:


if you used one of those scales to test your BF%, its likely not accurate. I had one tell me I was 30% bf, The same week I did a hydrostatic test (known to be accurate) and it placed me at under 20%. HUGE difference. The Military ones based on measurement don't really tell you anything either- online BF tests are pretty useless too- again they would tell me something like 25-30% bf, when I was actually more like 19.

Still, to lower bf and raise lean muscle mass, you should add weight training. Try to do weights higher than 15 lbs. But dont feel bad about your BF% based on what some gadget, or some thing on the internet, told you... if you want accurate BF test it has to be DEXA or hydrostatic (both usually only available in major cities or at universities, for about $50)

marekdds

Weights can tighten things up, but don't worry about it too much. I had a rude awakening this weekend. Apparently according to those calculators, older folks just have more fat. My 25 year old daughter & I are virtually the same height (she's a smidge shorter) and the same weight, same waist. We plugged the numbers into the online calculator. She got 21%, I got 26%, the only difference being I am 60. NOT FAIR! So I am at goal weight and I'm not going to worry about it anymore.
btw, my daughter was a college soccer player and is very fit.

CorvusCorax77

Weights can tighten things up, but don't worry about it too much. I had a rude awakening this weekend. Apparently according to those calculato, older folks just have more fat. My 25 year old daughter & I are virtually the same height (she's a smidge shorter) and the same weight, same waist. We plugged the numbers into the online calculator. She got 21%, I got 26%, the only difference being I am 60. NOT FAIR! So I am at goal weight and I'm not going to worry about it anymore.
btw, my daughter was a college soccer player and is very fit.

and this My BF will go up 1% in the course of a day because the day will come when I turn 36. I think that's BS! LOL!

No_Finish_Line

to be honest, i'd say that the online calculator you used is the best idea, and thats because the BF% number only has any real value as a measure of progress.

the reason why the online military style calculators are the best is becasue the input for the calculation is most accurate. The NUMBER ITSELF is not very accurate, but the input is, and therefore any changes are due to actual changes in your body and not abberations in the data. consider the following:

BF% scales use an electrical current and measure the resistance of the current after it passes through your body. How hydrated you are when you take the test will effect the out come, how much i am not sure, but if you happen to be more or less hydrated on subsiquent tests, its going to scew the result and you'll assume that the positive or negative outcome is the result of more or less fat on your body when it may not be.

Dont even get me started on the caliper. Even an expert is going to get three different readings on three tests done one right after the other. If the measurement isn't taken at exactly the same site each time, it will scew the results and you'll assume changes reflect real changes in body mass when they may not.

Now the tape measure is hard to get wrong. The BF% might be wildly off, but you can be confident that when it goes up or down its because of changes in your body mass because the input data is very reliable.

The hydrostatic weight would also be a good bet but its at least 60 bucks a visit