Given my fitness obsession, friends often ask me for health-related advice. And more often than not, the conversation begins like this: “I want to lose weight, but whatever I do, the scales don’t move.”
The issue I have with this conversation is normally not whether they are doing the right thing or not. It’s how they choose to measure their success. All a weighing scale will tell you is how much you weigh – and this is not important. Most scales won’t tell you what that weight is made up of.
We all know that muscle weighs more than fat. If, in your quest to achieve “weight loss”, you start incorporating an increased amount of resistance training, your weight will increase as your muscle mass does. What you really want to be measuring isn’t weight loss, it’s body fat loss and muscle gain. It’s a percentages game.
Given that sole function of traditional scales is to tell you how heavy you are and to provide you with a baseline metric to input into BMI (which is another pretty useless measurement) the next question is: What should you be using to monitor progress?
You need a way to measure changes in body fat and muscle gain percentages over time, as these two variables will lead to a more whittled down or shredded version of you. There are various ways of doing this:
Clothing fit: This is probably one of the best and easiest ways to gauge if you have leaned out. We all know how our clothes generally fit, and so if there is a discernible change, namely a bit more breathing room around the waist area or a bit more material sag, chances are you’ve lost some inches
Mirror, mirror on the wall: Most of us can tell if we have gained or lost weight by simply looking at ourselves naked in the mirror. And make sure you are gentle with yourself – your body deserves love.
Photos: Whilst I am not one for photos, the reality is, pictures don’t lie. Taking weekly photos really helps to monitor progress and assess whether your body is altering. It is remarkable way of monitoring weekly or bi-weekly progress as you ladder up to your goal.
Tape Measure: With a tape measure, you can easily measure the circumference of different body parts to assess leanness and/or muscle bulk. It is beneficial to take measurements on a regular cadence to monitor change.
Calipers: These nasty looking skin pinchers allow you to measure body fat percentages across different body parts. If you take measurements across 4 designated body parts (triceps, biceps, shoulder blade and waist), you will get a decent gauge as to your overall body fat percentage. Skinfold calipers provide an extremely accurate gauge on body fat percentage, with their only drawback being that some might find them rather invasive as a fat measurement utensil. With calipers, you can literally take fat measurements for any body part you wish. Although, sadly, you can’t target individual fat stores.
Body fat/ body composition scales: Unlike traditional scales, which simply measure weight, there are tons of body fat scales out there that provide more relevant and meaningful metrics like total body fat percentage, water percentage, BMI, and bone and muscle mass. Most of these scales use bio-electrical impedance to gauge the amount of lean mass, water and fat in your body by sending a current from the metal plates under your fat through your body. These scales are generally quite accurate (appreciating there is a small margin of error with most measurement tools) and if consistently used can provide a benchmark for progress. Most sync with wireless tech so metrics can be recorded and tracked over time. If you don’t want to invest in one (they can be expensive), most gyms have them on site and will employ them during a consult or induction session.
Hydrostatic weighing: This is probably the gold standard in body fat/muscle mass measurement but it is not terribly accessible and generally reserved for elite sporting athletes or those who have a pretty penny to spend. Hydrostatic or underwater weighing weighs the density of the body by evaluating dry vs. underwater weight. This has been deemed to be one of the most accurate techniques with very little margin of error, but accessibility and price tag do come at a premium.
Wearables: There is a heightened proliferation of fitness wearables on the market that help measure things like body fat percentage and muscle quality. I recently invested in the SKULPT, which is a device the size of a mobile phone that provides readings on body fat percentage and muscle quality. I will reserve my in-depth explanation and review of it for a future article. However, it is worth mentioning that there are a lot of wearables out there that measure such body composition metrics, and new ones are continually cropping up.
So let’s start moving the conversation away from “weight loss” to fat loss and muscle gain. Throw away your old-skool scales – they don’t serve you any more. And, as we all know, our hormonal cycle can add a good few pounds of water weight every month that can throw us off track. There are much better ways to measure your heard-earned progress.