Today I visited the Medtronic Health & Fitness Expo for the Minneapolis Marathon. One of the numerous exhibitors was a bod pod to test your body fat among other things. I was thinking of doing this for quite some time. Wa la! Here was my opportunity to try it out right in front of me. Those body test calipers are great at first but can get to be more of an art once the BF gets a little lower. I wanted a scientific accurate reading. It was a win win win. First in order to do the test I was required to sign up for a 5k that is in a few weeks. DONE. I wasn’t planning on it but now I will and try to improve my time. Second, I was able to find out some great information. See below:
% Fat - 12.8% and Resting Metabolic Rate (RMR) of 1766 kcal/day. I fell into the “moderately lean” category on the body fat rating. Oh so close to “lean”. Another .8 and I’ll be there.
If I was sedentary I would need to consume an estimated 2260 calories to stay at the level. Of course I don’t sit around all day and consider myself to meet the “very active” standard since I work out 6 times a week and don’t sit around much. With that in mind I would need to eat about 3673 calories! Another great example of how muscle burns fat. On my printout of the results, it listed a definition of muscle.
“Muscle is the metabolic engine of the body that burns calories (fat) and plays an important role in maintaining strength and energy. Healthy levels of fat-free mass contribute to physical fitness and may prevent conditions such as osteoporosis”. It was a great reminder for me.
Third, my girls were able to sit in the “Pod” and pretend it was a spaceship. Yes, I did need to walk around the booth in just a pair of spandex for a few minutes in front of a large expo crowd. Ahh who cares. I am confident, maybe not so much a year ago. Too bad my iPhone was locked up at the time and couldn’t get a picture of that one! No lie.
It was a great time visiting all the booths. What was even better was after we left I started to realize something. My lower back that has been very problematic in the last week and has been painful even when sitting down, all of a sudden seemed a little better. I liked the overall feel of being around a bunch of healthy, fit and like minded people. I felt more energy just by being around it. There were great samples of organic snacks, clothing with funny runner’s jokes like “does this shirt make my butt look FAST?” and “I’m only doing this so I can post a picture on Facebook.” The testing gave me a great gauge that I can use to look back on in the future to see how I am progressing towards my goals. I will definitely try this again.
