How to Measure Your Body Fat With Callipers
by Tanya Zilberter, PhD
A good old method to measure body fat, not just weight, is a skinfold measurement. You purchase a skinfold caliper (it's usually inexpensive, the link below will lead you to the calliper that costs $39.95) and pinch your skin along with under-skin fat in several (7 to 20) designated areas, then produce a simple calculation as your caliper manual instructs. Why so many pinches? Because one can store his or her fat in quite different places: as you surely noticed, there are people having a tine waistline and broad hips, or that are heavy in the bottom and slim in the shoulders, and so on. By the way, the very fat distribution can tell about this particular person's health risks (you've heard of course of "apples and pears"), but this is
another story.
A healthy male's body should be approximately 12 percent to 18 percent fat.
In females, the number is slightly higher; approximately 14 percent to 20 percent fat.
This is probably the most accurate and affordable way:FatTrack Computerized Body Fat Calipers Building muscle is one thing, but building solid, lean, fat free muscle is quite another. You have to train right, you have to eat right, and you have to make sure you are supplementing correctly. But even with all this covered you need an accurate way to measure just how well your program is working. Sure the scale might be going up, but is the majority of weight you are gaining muscle? Now there is a new state of the art way to monitor your lean mass and body fat levels accurately and conveniently. It's called FatTrack and it's absolutely awesome. FatTrack is a computerized skinfold caliper that is ultra-accurate down to the millimeter. It uses a patent pending "Floating Code Thickness Measuring System" that detects the smallest change in measurement with unmatched accuracy. FatTrack stores each measurement in memory and then calculates your body fat percentage instantly and accurately. There is no math to do, FatTrack does it all for you. FatTrack can store data for up to three people and has an "undo" function so you can take multiple measurements until you get it perfect. FatTrack has a "self-calibration" feature that maintains a lifetime measuring accuracy. It also stores maximum and minimum thickness at each measuring site so you can monitor, with a Statistical Report, exactly what is happening with your body fat levels. FatTrack comes with complete detailed instructions as well as tips on how make your measurements as accurate as possible. This is a "must-have" tool in your quest for optimum physical condition. Body Calculators:Body Calculators: References: 1. Generalized equations for predicting body
density
of men. A.S. Jackson and M.L. Pollock. Br J Nutr, 40(3):497-504, Nov
1978. |
