I am officially obese!

onomatopoeia said:
Is that having two fasting days a week with very low (circa 500) calorie intake?

If so, my employer has been doing it and has got his weight down. The reduction is very gradual, a pound or so a week.
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That's the one.
 
I'd go for helium implants....you can be as big as you want and as light as you want at the same time.
 
nilagin said:
I'm 0.4 less using the new system. It still rates me as obese and with a 31" waist, it's still not really any better than the old system
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It's still a major failing of any of these calculation systems that they can't allow for the relative proportions of muscle mass to fat.

Since muscle weighs more, muscly folk will always show a higher result in a BMI calculation - a notable and oft-quoted example being in cases where the subject has started going to a gym to get fitter, where, as fat is replaced by muscle, their overall size decreases while their weight rises, increasing the exaggerative effect of this type of dislocation between girth and BMI, since the latter can tend to rise in direct relationship to the former decreasing.
 
What should really matter is body fat percentage. Anything else is irrelevant. It's the high body fat content, particularly the visceral fat, that is the danger.
 
nilagin said:
I'm 0.4 less using the new system. It still rates me as obese and with a 31" waist, it's still not really any better than the old system
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Wheras I'm 20.1 (20.9 on the old system) with a 34" waist. I don't "work out" though so my weight is fat.

Six months ago I weighed a stone more and scored 21.8 (or 22.7 on the old system), but was struggling to get in to my 34" waist trousers, so had to take action, or be faced with buying a lot of new clothes.

It seems BMI is fine as a measure for people that live largely sedentary lives, but for those that work on building up muscle it will not give a meaningful result.
 
I've ordered the Hairy Bikers book which will hopefully arrive early in the week. I've always been slim but after having my daughter I'm huge. So a mix of feeding a hungry baby, hairy biker food and rowing machine will hopefully sort me out.
 
I've found switching to diet coke instead of normal, not snacking and making sure I am eating the right amount so that I am hungry at the next meal.

I can still eat mcDonalds, but go for the Chicken Nugget meal with diet coke (500 calories).

When I am not out and about everywhere I was losing a steady 2lbs a week.

My standard diet was 2 weetabix for breakfast, pot noodle for lunch, apple for snack and dried pasta, pesto and salami for dinner.

I had that for around 4 days a week and lost weight even when having a takewaway or going out for a meal at the weekend.
 
First of all, the height/weight/waist way of measuring BMI is useless.

If you want an idea of your BMI, then either get the scales that send an electrical pulse through your body or see a GP or maybe a gym if they have the kit.

You need a way that the muscle mass is measured.

During a fitness phase in the RAF I had a BMI of 11, this was done properly by a PTI with correct kit.

The way you are all talking about doesn't separate fat from muscle, basic flaw in system.
 
It's amazing how many people like to point out the BMI system is flawed. And it is - most athletes (or ones who play American power sports anyway) come up as obese.

Here's a simple test:
1. Could you run a 10K this afternoon in less than 40 mins and not feel the need to tell anybody about it?
2. Can you do more than 60 proper push ups in a minute?
3. Do you earn £300,000 a week?

If the answer to all those is "no" then you're not an athlete for whom the BMI calculation is skewed, you're fat. In fact, if you're obese then you will die sooner because of your weight (that's one of the definitions).

[Yes, there are a small number of outliers who seem to be perfectly healthy at weights far higher than recommended. Just like there are some people who can smoke all their lives and never become ill from it. But the only real way to find out if you are one of those is to see when you die so it's not a great test.]
 
JonathanRyan said:
It's amazing how many people like to point out the BMI system is flawed. And it is - most athletes (or ones who play American power sports anyway) come up as obese.

Here's a simple test:
1. Could you run a 10K this afternoon in less than 40 mins and not feel the need to tell anybody about it?
2. Can you do more than 60 proper push ups in a minute?
3. Do you earn £300,000 a week?

If the answer to all those is "no" then you're not an athlete for whom the BMI calculation is skewed, you're fat. In fact, if you're obese then you will die sooner because of your weight (that's one of the definitions).

[Yes, there are a small number of outliers who seem to be perfectly healthy at weights far higher than recommended. Just like there are some people who can smoke all their lives and never become ill from it. But the only real way to find out if you are one of those is to see when you die so it's not a great test.]
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I'd say no to all three questions above although I'd say I'd be close on no. 2, but at 93-95kg, BMI says I'm obese but my bodyfat is between 12 and 15% and a waist measurement of 31".
 
I think I mentioned this before but although athletes will have skewed the BMI, the majority of the population who are obese or morbidly obese do not do anything that remotely looks like sport, with maybe the exception of shovelling food into their mouths.
 
My mate lifts heavy weights for fun. Short arse with big muscles, eats well and doesn't have much fat on him.
Going by the height/weight chart you would say he spends all his time eating McD's.
Some companies use this chart as a requirement for doing certain jobs, flawed system YES
 
JonathanRyan said:
Here's a simple test:
1. Could you run a 10K this afternoon in less than 40 mins and not feel the need to tell anybody about it?
2. Can you do more than 60 proper push ups in a minute?
3. Do you earn £300,000 a week?
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1.No
2.No
3.No

Im classed as underweight, you have been very narrowminded in your post.
 
panther_87k said:
Im classed as underweight, you have been very narrowminded in your post.
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Then your BMI would be less than 20....?

This was intended for all the people who come up with high BMIs and think "well, I'm probably an athlete". I was trying to make the point that it's pretty much impossible to be an athlete without realising it :D

There should probably be another test on there for strength athletes - maybe being able to lift double your bodyweight or something.

In fact those questions are accidentally prejudiced against women. Not only are there no elite women earning anything like £300K per week, I suspect there are a tiny number of women in the world who can do 60 pressups in a minute. There's no official record for pushups in a minute but the women's record is 190 in 3 minutes.

But for some reason, it tends to be men who think they might be an athlete without realising it :D
 
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