Comments on: What’s your bodyfat percentage?

By: Weight Loss » Blog Archive » What is your bodyfat percentage? | Ask Jayson Hunter

Thu, 22 Jan 2009 19:25:19 +0000

[...] Original post by unknown [...]

By: Jayson

Jayson — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 17:55:44 +0000

They were created for the life insurance companies. They are ok for those people that are sedentary and do no active workouts at all. For those that participate in any type of exercise though the BMI chart is not an accurate measuring tool.

Jayson

By: Jim Labadie

Jim Labadie — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 17:45:54 +0000

Weren’t most of those ridiculous BMI charts created in the 1950’s?

By: Jayson

Jayson — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 15:15:32 +0000

I agree that many times the numbers are misleading because they tend to use the BMI as a measuring tool for obesity which can be skewed if the person also contains a lot of muscle.

For example I am borderline overweight according to the BMI charts except I have 11% bodyfat. It is because they are only looking at my height and weight and not taking into consideration my build.

What I stated in the post is this: “So almost a third of the men polled are considered overweight or obese.”.

What I meant by this is that the 27% who have a bodyfat percentage of 20% or more are overweight or obese. Not all are considered obese. For example someone with a 21% bodyfat is most likely just overweight where someone with a 33% bodyfat could be considered obese. We don’t know how many of those people above 20% are just slightly above or grossly above.

That is why I said overweight or obese because we don’t know the numbers above 20%.

Jayson

By: Rob Steinert

Rob Steinert — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 14:58:28 +0000

Hi Jayson – I had a couple questions about the 20% bodyfat point. I have looked at a number of articles and charts and have yet to run across one that stated over 20% for the age group you targeted was obese. Most of them start at 23% -26%.

I myself, am 42, 6 foot tall and was weighing in at 200 pounds with a bodyfat of 19.9%. I would have to say I was no where close to obese. I think many times these numbers can be misleading depending on the build of the person.

I do agree with you, America is moving towards being very overweight and people like you and I need to do everything we can to help prevent it.

I think your idea of giving up the worst 3 items is great. And really quite simple. I would suggest everyone reading this do that very thing.

Keep up the great work!

Rob Steinert