Let InBody help you achieve your Goals
Now you are home with your InBody results - let's review where you are and what you need to do.
Lose Weight - Lose Fat
Your weight depends on the amount of calories you consume versus the amount of calories you burn off. If you take in more calories than your body needs, you gain weight. Take in less and you lose weight.
More importantly, we want to lose weight healthily- we want to lose fat not muscle. Take in too few calories and that is what may happen, you will lose muscle not fat.
InBody lets you know your BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate)
This is the amount of calories your body needs just to keep its vital functions going - heart beating, lungs pumping, brain working.
InBody uses John Cunningham's formula for BMR which takes into account your fat free mass.
Ie Your metabolically active tissue - the more muscle you have the higher your BMR. This gives greater accuracy in calculating your BMR. There are other formulas used that only use height, weight and age - these are not as accurate.
Then we work out your daily needs (technically speaking - Total Daily Energy Expenditure). This is the amount of calories you need each day to maintain your weight.
| Amount of Exercise | Total Daily Energy Expenditure (TDEE) |
|---|---|
| Sedentary Lifestyle, little or no exercise | TDEE = BMR x 1.2 |
| Light activity, exercise 1-3 days per week | TDEE = BMR x 1.375 |
| Moderate activity, 3-5 days per week | TDEE = BMR x 1.55 |
| High activity, 6-7 days per week | TDEE = BMR x 1.725 |
EG.BMR = 1400 calories TDEE = 1400 x 1.375 for light activity = 1925 calorie intake daily to maintain current weight
How many calories do I need a day to lose fat?
Once we know your TDEE then we can subtract enough calories to lose weight healthily. It is important to realise that 1lb (0.45kg) of fat is equal to 3,500 calories = 500 calories a day.
This means you need to either reduce your TDEE intake by 500 calories a day to lose a pound of fat a week, or increase your activity to burn off an extra 500 calories a day.
Eg. TDEE = 1925 cal. – 500 cal. = 1425 calories to eat per day to lose that one pound of fat.
InBody helps you keep on track
When you use InBody it captures your weight and breaks it down into various elements. Weight alone tells us very little. We Want to know how much fat we have lost and how much muscle we have gained.
Muscle Mass
InBody shows how much skeletal muscle mass you have. This is important because this is the muscle mass you can change through exercise and activity. Also the more muscle mass you have, the higher your BMR and therefore the higher your TDEE. Muscle burns calories. Muscle is the good guy, the friend you want to keep.
Fat Mass
This is the amount of fat in kg within your total weight. Do we need fat ? Yes - not only does it provide an important source of energy, it also helps protect our organs, insulates our bodies, helps transmit nerve impulses and is essential in the absorption of several vitamins (A,D,E & K)
BMI
looks at your height to weight ratio, however it does not take into account what your weight is made up of, so can be flawed as a marker of obesity and / or health. This is of note particularly with children, teenagers, pregnant women, competitive athletes, body builders, people over the age of 65 and in some ethnic groups.
% Fat
taking your body fat mass as a percentage of your total weight is a much more accurate reflection of your health and / or obesity.
BMR
Basal metabolic rate. Back to where we started !
So now you have all the information you need to keep on track and achieve that number one desire – to lose weight and get fitter !
