Body Composition: The most important measurement in your quest for a better body

Ruth and I feel very strongly that high precision body composition measurements, especially serial measurements, play an important role for trainers as they assist their clients in both athletic as well as weight reduction goals. We also appreciate hearing from others that are passionate about the roles of muscle and fat mass in sport, aging and health.

The following is an excerpt from a recent article written by one of our local partners, Craig Bymoen. Craig is the CEO and founder of Edu-Fit Personal Training and trains out of Vancouver, B.C. He can be reached at www.edu-fit.ca

This is because muscle is a metabolically active tissue that will aid us in our quest to rid ourselves of excess adipose (fat) tissue. Muscle burns calories to move your skeleton through space as well as maintain itself. Muscle mass is a contributing factor for the improvement of musculoskeletal health and the enhancement of
movement capabilities.(Murcell, 2003) So we must pay close attention to the amount of muscle that our bodies possess.
During our lifetime our bodies will accrue a specific amount of muscle related to the activities we partake in on a daily basis, the type of nutrition we consume and also genetics. We need this muscle in order to be able to carry out our day to day activities for the remainder of our natural born lives. And in fact, our bodies will already do us a big disservice by losing some of this muscle as we age if we don’t use it. The process has come to be known as sarcopenia or age related muscle loss. In John Berrardi’s book The Metabolism Advantage, he states that, “Researchers have determined that, starting between the ages of 25 and 30, most people will lose roughly 5-10 pounds of muscle with each decade of life.” A recent study in The International Journal of Sports Medicine concluded that, “This can mean a loss of 20% of your total muscle between the ages of only 40-60.” To further compound the situation Berrardi states, “The average person who becomes less active and consequently loses muscle will experience a 20-25% reduction in 24 hour metabolism (measured as the amount of energy your body burns in a 24 hour period) by age 65.” He then goes on to note that, “Scientists have estimated that the RMR (the part of your metabolism that accounts for 60-75 percent of all the calories you burn each day) is highly dependant on muscle mass. In fact, 75-80 percent of your RMR is determined by your muscle mass. The more muscle you have, the higher the RMR. The less muscle you have the lower the RMR.”

You can read the full text of the article at the following link.
Body Composition: The most important measurement in your quest for a better body
by Craig Bymoen of edu-fit.ca (PDF)