Tuesday, January 18, 2005

The Arrival of the Scale

A humbling experience, but one from which I think I will ultimately benefit.

It turns out my old scale, either on its own or through my repeated verbal and physical abuse, was weighing 5 lbs under. I kind of suspected this, but I'm now mentally ready to accept it. So my weight zoomed up overnight, from 132 to 137. And my body fat percentage is 34%. Which is definitely outside of where it wants to be, according to this chart. My goal would be well within the "fitness" category, say 22%. So.... if 34% of my current weight is fat, then approximately 90 lbs of me is lean body mass. Assuming that doesn't go down, my goal weight would be approximately 110 lbs. (If you don't know me and you're reading this and being all horrified that I should want to be so thin, please be aware that I'm barely 5 feet tall, and 110 lbs is a nice healthy weight for someone my height.) What I would really like to do though, is up my lean body mass by another 5 lbs and weigh about 115, which I think is more sustainable and would probably look a bit better.

What I'm interested to see is how fast the fat percentage is going to change. I can generally lose 2-3 lbs a week without too much difficulty, but I wonder if some of that is muscle, and if I should be upping my protein intake a bit. I'm not going to change my diet until I see how this goes though.

5 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Oooh now I totally want a body-fat analyis done, but the only way I know of getting one is to go to Fitness World for a trial membership. I don't think it's worth going through the sales pitch every time I want an updated body fat analysis. I doubt the community centre gym that I go to (which meets ALL of my other needs including being cheap and friendly) has such a tool. Bummer. Any suggestions for me?

12:09 PM  
Blogger spughy said...

Anonymous, if you're Sue like I think you are, you can use my scale the next time you're in town. If you're not Sue, but I do know you, let me know who you are and you can still use my scale :-)

12:59 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Would this work with cats?

2:06 PM  
Blogger spughy said...

it would work with a cat if:

1) your cat could spread its legs, horizontally, about 1 foot
2) your cat was over 3 feet tall
3) you could get your cat to stay still for more than 2 seconds.

You be the judge.

2:09 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The first anonymous was me. The second, definitely not. :D

9:47 AM  

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