Here I stand, on the scales of injustice

The weighing scales in my local gym is out by almost two-and-a-half stone.

I’m 13st 6lb on it.

Happy days.

There are two scales in the gym, but the other is accurate, so I don’t use it much. It’s a smartarse, top-of-the-range model that slips effortlessly between kilograms and stones/pounds, and for some reason displays the day, month and year in the corner of the digital screen: that’s hardly the kind of date anyone is thinking of when they’re standing on it.

I prefer the other one. It may be old and woefully inaccurate, but it’s so off the mark that surely no one has ever thought their 30-minute workout produced such an incredibly instant result.

And, more importantly, it’s one of the few weighing scales to bring a smile to people’s faces when they use it.

Recently, I’ve become rather addicted to standing on scales.

Relationship with gravity

Before my new fitness drive, I never cared about my relationship with gravity. Now, I’m studying notes on previous readings – as well as using other equally crude measurements to track my progress, or lack of it.

In theory, body mass index (BMI = weight in kilograms divided by height in metres squared) should be a more accurate indicator of whether someone is overweight. The World Health Organisation states that, for adults, the healthy range for BMI is between 18.5 and 24.9. Overweight is 25-29.9. Apparently, obesity begins at a BMI of 30, which is bad news if yours is 30.1.

But, as with the weighing scales, BMI is fundamentally flawed, not taking into account muscle mass or bone density, among other factors.

Calculating fat percentage can be a little more complicated. Body fat has a low electric conductivity, and so you can use a special monitor to send a tiny electric current through the body: this gives you a reading as to what percentage of your body is fat. Anything above 25 per cent is obese. (I’ll save you looking at the chart, mine is 29.8 per cent and, dishearteningly, going up.)

Again, a method with serious disclaimers.

Fundamentally flawed

Every year an expert announces that using weighing scales, or BMI or fat percentage readings, or whatever is in fashion at the time, is fundamentally flawed. The media take notice. Everyone agrees. And then people continue to use them: particularly the common bathroom scales.

It seems curious that such a crude device, which has been around in some shape or form for thousands of years, is still so commonly used, and viewed, and viewed again, and noted, and trusted.

A weighing scales should not be trusted. And that goes especially for the accurate ones. Though it’s not all the fault of the scales: it cannot be expected to solve a problem that’s not related to weight.

I’m suspicious of anything that has the ability to alter someone’s mood. Every weighing scales is a talking one. Even the most primitive of machines. They whisper, usually about how dissatisfied you should feel about yourself.

My bathroom scales has a cold, dispassionate and rigid attitude to dispensing numbers. It simply doesn’t understand me the way the gym scales does.

So we may have to break up for a while or, at least, have a more casual relationship.

As with every part of my new exercise routine, my body immediately asked my brain to work out some way of cheating, and my mind is always willing to be an accessory. And so it was quickly determined that a weighing scales could fluctuate by up to 5lb in a day, depending on the time of day, and whether it was used before or after a meal.

Standing on a weighing scales every day is nonsense.

However, it is useful as an indicator of a trend.

As long as that trend is in the direction you’re hoping for.

DAMIAN STATS
Age: 39 
Height: 6ft
Weight: 15st 12lb (-9lb)
BMI: 30.1 (-0.3)
Fat: 29.8% (+0.2)

Brackets indicates change since 

March 10th, 2015, when Damian started 

to change his diet and exercise habits  

and to write this column.