What Is Body Fat Percentage?
Body fat percentage is the percentage of your total body mass that is made of fat.
So if a 200 pound guy has 20 lbs. of fat on his body, he has 10% body fat (20/200=10%).
The remaining 180 lbs., or 90% of his total body mass (i.e. muscle, bone, organs, water, etc.), is considered his lean body mass (LBM).
Why Is Body Fat Percentage Important?
The lower your body fat percentage is, the leaner you are.
The higher your body fat percentage, the fatter you are. After a certain threshold (around 25-30% body fat for men, 30-35% for women), it starts to become unhealthy.
If your goal is to get lean, tacking body fat percentage over time provides valuable data that you can use to reach your goal faster.
Tracking body fat is better than tracking only your body weight…
…Why? Because losing, let’s say, 20 lbs of body weight does not necessarily mean you lost 20 lbs of body fat. Some of that weight loss could be from water, muscle glycogen and/or muscle tissue. And it should go without saying that you want to keep as much muscle as possible.
Similarly, if you’re trying to bulk up and build muscle, you shouldn’t just track your body weight. If you gain weight for the sake of seeing the number on the scale go up, you’re bound to put on an excessive amount of body fat.
Tracking your body fat in addition to body weight will help to minimize fat gains as you bulk.
