How Do I Know What My Body Fat Percentage Is?

**mgsondance** · January 29th, 2011, 07:44 AM

I've talked before about body fat percentage- it's a much more important number than your BMI. You can be at your "correct" weight and still have an abnormally high BF percentage. You can also be "overweight", and due to having a lot of muscle, be very lean.

We've also talked about how to measure this. Unfortunately, the only true ways to do so are expensive and hard to access. Those include the Dexa Scan, Bod Pod, and Underwater Weighing. Electrical impedance machines and measuring by calipers both lean toward being inconsistent and inaccurate.

I came across this method online, and thought it was interesting. It's used by the US Navy, and they say it can be quite accurate if you are careful with your measurements. Interestingly, I just tried this- and it came out within .1% of what my Omron hand-held unit said my BF was.

http://lowcarbdiets.about.com/librar...calculator.htm

**Beth_M** · January 29th, 2011, 02:27 PM

hmm interesting 29.2% near what my nighttime % is on my scale

**mgsondance** · January 29th, 2011, 02:34 PM

i thought it was interesting how close it was to my omron unit- and i've never heard of this method before.

**Feisty** · January 29th, 2011, 02:47 PM

Ok I've bookmarked this thread. I'm not NEAR ready to start looking at that yet but The day is coming.

**mgsondance** · January 29th, 2011, 03:28 PM

it's good to do it now, feisty. even if you just take the measurements and don't let it do the calculation. then you can compare later on.

**Feisty** · January 29th, 2011, 03:29 PM

Originally Posted by mgsondance

it's good to do it now, feisty. even if you just take the measurements and don't let it do the calculation. then you can compare later on.

No I seriously don't want to know. Especially right now..... Maybe I'll brave it next week.

**mgsondance** · January 29th, 2011, 03:32 PM

you don't need to know, feisty- they have you take certain measurements (height, neck, waist and hips in centimeters) and then they calculate it for you. so you can just take the measurements and don't press the "calculate" button- later on, when you want to compare, you can enter your original measurements.

**Feisty** · January 29th, 2011, 03:39 PM

well I don't have a tape measure.... So that's how many beads on the super long mardigras necklace I use to measure... hmmmmm.

TheBigLD · February 17th, 2011, 03:42 PM

Tape measure test is a joke. Don't use it at all! I have seen guys with crazy abs who fail the tape test done by the military.

**Kagee** · February 17th, 2011, 04:24 PM

Hang in there, Feisty - be your name - let out a roar ; )

to all, I tried the calculator
- came out within 1% of my landlord's scale this morning - then accordingly, if I do my calculations right and use 22% as my goal fat percent... then the Dr's idea of my final weight being 124 is not far off... 22% would make it 131 for my final goal weight. *sigh* hoping he'd be wrong; it's a long way from here... I know, one lb at a time. was down .6 this morning.

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