Scale Weight, Weighing, and Measurements

Your weight on your scale isn't a truly useful number. Not when it comes to fitness.

Your scale weight is the sum total of:

- your muscle mass
- your organ mass
- your bone mass
- your fat mass
- water, in all of the systems above
- food that you ate and didn't eliminate yet
- your hair
- whatever clothes you happen to have on
- in my case, plus my glasses because it's hard to read a floor-level-readout scale without them.

. . . all totaled up, with a margin of error based on the scale, possibly the floor (ever move a scale and have it change?), and other factors.

So it's a number that represents all the things you want, plus all of the things you don't want.

But people will put that number up as a goal - "lose 5 pounds." "Drop 10 kilos by Fall." "Pack on 15 pounds by September 1st for the beginning of team practices."

Yet that number isn't so useful.


On top of that, it can be tough on yourself - it's a result goal, not a process goal. And it's tough on trainers, too.

If you're a trainer tracking a client's weight, you get one of three responses:

1) The client is okay with getting weighed, regardless of the results.

2) The client is not okay with getting weighed, regardless of the results.

3) The client only wants to get weighed when he or she is certain the results are positive.

Two out of three of them aren't useful ways to track weight as a metric. #1 is. #2, you don't get the scale weight metric anyway. #3 only gives you sporadic data points, and only when those data points are going in the right direction. #3 types generally are the ones struggling, too, and weighing gets less and less frequent. And if they just happen to hit a high day (saltier foods the day before, say, causing more water retention, or food that hasn't passed yet) it comes on the rare times they're ready to give it a go . . . and it's crushing.

So it ends up being only those clients who'd probably track the metric themselves who get the benefit of a daily data point.

So I only use it with clients who pretty much self-select into the #1 category.

All of that said, I also weigh myself every day. But I also take measurements - body fat (using an electrical impedance scale, which isn't terribly accurate) and waist and hips. I take measurements and photos several times a year to check my appearance and posture.

So it's not like I think weight per se is valueless. But I don't like dealing with pure weight loss goals.

If your scale weight is clearly high, by all means get it down. You can tell if it is - your waist is hanging over your belt. Your old clothes don't fit because they're too small - and they didn't shrink.

Those things could more easily be tracked my other measurements.

Belly getting bigger and you don't fit 36s but need 38s now? Medium shirts are too tight and it's not because you got bigger shoulders? Dress size went up? Those are more relevant numbers.

But keep in mind it's worth knowing other measurements. I like these:

Waist circumference (at the belly button)
Hip circumference (widest part of the hips)
Arm circumference (widest part of the biceps, flexed)
Thigh circumference (mid-thigh, flexed)
Calf circumference (widest part of the calf)
Resting Heart Rate

If you do choose to weigh yourself, here are my tips: Use the same body fat scale the same time every day, and monitor the trend up or down. Use the same scale and weigh yourself regularly. Keep all of the parameters the same and write it all down. But don't do just that.

Torso Position on Split Squats

Quick alert about a good post:

Coaching Torso Positon on Split-Squats

I love Bulgarian Split Squats. I use them with everyone, basically, for strength, balance, and hip health.

Short version:

Want to emphasize strength? Bent over torso position.

Want to emphasize loosening up those tight hips from sitting? Upright torso position.

Also note that he sets up from the bottom. I use this a lot.

Review: Yoga Tune-Up Alpha Ball

Also available in a twin pack.

The Alpha Ball is a self-care, self-massage tool. It's meant to be paired with Jill Miller's book The Roll Model, but even without it, it's an excellent tool.

The ball measures 3.5" and is made of rubber. It is both soft and firm - just soft enough for some give but firm enough to get a real massaging effect.

It's hard to describe how useful this ball is. At 3.5", it's small enough to get into tight spots, but large enough to hit a big area even on larger muscle groups. The surface of the ball is just grippy enough to let you twist and grip skin. This allows you to pin and isolate the areas underneath you want to work on. Unlike a smoother ball, it won't easily "squirt" out from its position between your limbs, between you and the wall, between you and the floor, etc. Unless a harder ball, it won't so easily bruise tender tissues.

It's not cheap, but it's so useful it only seems expensive. It's quite durable, although they will wear out. That said, my original ball has seen daily use for eight months by many people and hasn't shown any signs of ill use.

Overall: This is one of the best equipment purchases I have ever made. I bought one for myself, one for my gym to use with clients, and I've purchased one for almost every one of my clients and several of my friends. It's just the right size for so many movements. Several clients of other coaches who have used my ball at the gym purchased their own. Highly recommended.

The Power of Someone Else's Belief

Today I had a good day:



Check the bottom right hand corner. That's my first ever mention on a gym's record board.



As I said to my coach when I finished, I wouldn't have even tried the 2000m row if he hadn't said I could set the record. I just didn't know if I could sustain a pace for 2000m. I can go long grappling, but rowing long distance isn't something I usually do. Yet I managed to edge the previous record by almost 4 full seconds.

But it's hard to say, "I can't" or not try when someone says, "You can do this, go and do it." Not only that, but I did it after setting a PR in single-leg box squat negatives, too. None of this is world-record breaking. I'm sure the record will fall. But it's an achievement I didn't know I had in me and I'm proud of it.

It's a great thing to keep in mind as a coach - simply believing in a client, and communicating that belief, can be extremely powerful. It can drive an attempt that the client wouldn't even consider. Belief is powerful!

Free Online Fitness Professional Summit

This June, from 6/20 - 6/25, will be the second annual Fitness Professionals Online Summit.

You can sign up for it here:

Fitness Professionals Online Summit

I signed up last year, and although I wasn't able to see all of the presentations, I saw many of them. They were interesting and useful. It was more useful than some paid seminars I attended, as well.

Although it is aimed at fitness professionals, there might be a seminar or two useful to non-fitness professionals, too.