Percentages Question

Former Member

Here's a maths question for you.

If you were 23% body fat and went to the gym and you're now 20% body fat, what do you say?

You lost 3% body fat or you lost 13% fat?? (i.e. 3 divided 23)

Former Member

You lost 3% fat.

Former Member

well 23-3 = 20 :chin:

Former Member

i guess you could say that you lost 13% OF your body fat...

Former Member

Originally posted by Angel121077
i guess you could say that you lost 13% OF your body fat...

No, he lost 3% of his body fat.

Former Member

Originally posted by Fiend_85
No, he lost 3% of his body fat.

well if you look at this 23% as a whole... and he lost 3% of that... that's 13% of the body fat that he had.. no?

23%:3%::100%:13%

Former Member

no, because 20% body fat is that of the whole body. therefore he went down from 23% to 20% which is a 3% loss.

he did not lose 3% of the 20%.

i think you can actually say 3% whole body fat, or 13% of his fat.

Former Member

i'd just settle for losing weight, that maths crap confuses me.

Former Member

Originally posted by turlough
i'd just settle for losing weight, that maths crap confuses me.

Yeah but when you lose fat you can also gain muscle which is 3 times heavier so you might be getting slimmer but not losing actual weight

Former Member

Actually, muscle size for size is only 40% heavier, not three times heavier.

Former Member

Look - I don't what any of you are going on about, but basically here is how you work it out properly...

Once you know your bodyfat % then you can calculate how many lbs of fat you have & therefore how much lean mass you have..

eg 180lbs & 20% bf

180 x 20% = 36lbs fat

180 - 36 = 144lbs lean mass

So you need to get your weight and % each time and you can work it...

Former Member

buuuuuuuuuuuuut you asked us which expression was correct!

Former Member

Yeah so

Weight (W) x BF% = lbs fat (X)

W - X = LMB

Indrid Cold

Someone should erase this discussion from the boards, before someone who wanted to lose weight gets discouraged...