Hand held body fat testers

[nefertiti]

I was at the gym yesterday and I decided to, for the first time, start tracking my training progress by doing periodic body fat testing. The kind of tester they had was some hand held thing that sent electromagnetic signals or something through the body.

My question is, how accurate are these? Because the number it gave me seemed awfully low considering I only just started doing regular workouts again a couple of weeks ago (I had a longish break because of knee problems, during which time I was still active, just not gym-active).

 

[Thandie]

I was at the gym yesterday and I decided to, for the first time, start tracking my training progress by doing periodic body fat testing. The kind of tester they had was some hand held thing that sent electromagnetic signals or something through the body.

My question is, how accurate are these? Because the number it gave me seemed awfully low considering I only just started doing regular workouts again a couple of weeks ago (I had a longish break because of knee problems, during which time I was still active, just not gym-active).

Very inaccurate as far as I'm concerned. I've done it a number of times and is always completely different then any other tests. That said, the number I got was inaccurately higher then it should have been.

 

[nefertiti]

Meh... unless you are competing IMHO this may play with your head.

I think that a simple tape measure and/or periodic digital pics in the same outfit/same lighting will be a better guage of progress. And then there is always performance, ie strength/endurance.

You think? With my history I want to not worry about things like size. Just my body composition. The thing is I'm too thin right now and I need to gain weight. I just want to gain muscle instead of fat. the best way for me to mentally get past getting bigger and heavier is to know that I'm not actually adding more fat.

 

[nefertiti]

Well given that I know it will fluctuate some, I was only going to test it like once a month. I do see what you're saying. But I go temporarily crazy when I see my weight go up. And the same would happen if I was using a tape measure and saw that number increase (unless I knew it was because of adding some muscle). I figured bf was the safest thing for me to monitor without backsliding into old bad habits.

 

[nefertiti]

DONT GET ON THE SCALE.

As for the tape measure, that is simple. If you are gaining size because you are gaining mass then your waistline will NOT increase. The number for your hips might if your glutes grow but you will see that in the mirror too. If you are gaining fat around your hips that will be abundantly clear. As for your arms and legs, you will see that if the muscle is growing, then the number on the tape measure will go up, but you will see more "cuts". If the number goes up due to bf gain then you will visibly see LESS muscle.

Did I explain that properly?

yes, I understand. I'll give that a shot. thanks BM, you're a lifesaver today.