If you train, even eventually, you’ve probably come across content or coachs and personalities planning diets and workouts aimed at lowering your body fat percentage, haven’t you! 

The practice we mentioned is so common among athletes that many people think that body fat levels are directly linked to health, but this is not always an absolute truth. 

It happens that these new strategies adopted by some athletes, when badly publicized, spread quickly as a type of “strategy to achieve the perfect body”, and when aligned to social networks, it is quite common that several concepts and ideas from the fitness world end up being quickly spread incorrectly among the less experienced. 

Among these concepts that generate a lot of uncertainty in people are the body mass index, body fat and body composition, which we will address in this content, after all, it is very important to understand all this before setting any goals. Check it out: 

What is body composition?

As the name implies, body composition is the “metric” responsible for measuring the amount of each component present in the human body, and in it, the amounts of water, bones, muscles, and fat are measured. 

It is worth remembering that these amounts vary a lot from person to person, and the main responsible for these differences are genetic factors, eating habits, and lifestyles. 

To measure body composition, there are currently three main ways, X-Ray, Hydrostatic Weighing, and Bioimpedance. 

Put like this, it may sound like body composition is the same thing as the well-known BMI, but definitely not!

What is the difference between body composition and BMI

While the body composition index is able to measure the amount of each of the components of the human body, the BMI, although it has been widely used for many years as the best method available, has been recognized by scientists as a flawed methodology, after all, it only analyzes the height in relation to people’s weight, which does not take into account the amount of that weight that represents muscles, bones, or actually, body fat. 

Because of this, nowadays BMI methods are no longer used, and only tests that can actually determine body composition are allowed in medicine. But why is this important after all?

Importance of paying attention to the level of body fat

Although thousands of people care about their body fat levels merely for aesthetic purposes, which is not wrong either, their body composition indexes are important for several reasons, after all, even excessive thinness and the absence of fat or muscle mass are detrimental to the quality of life. 

Anyway, it is important to keep track of your fat levels simply because the excess fat in the body is responsible for several health problems, and if not controlled, there are chances of developing diseases such as hypertension, diabetes, heart attack, stroke, and even cancer. 

So, don’t worry only about your aesthetics and emotional well being, taking care of your health and nutrition is fundamental! 

What is the “ideal” body composition?

Well, now that you understand a little bit more about the subject and you also understand that there is not always a relation between body fat and health, we will guide you on what is understood as “Ideal Body Composition”. 

Basically, according to some experts, the ideal amount of body fat for men is an average of 15 to 21%, and for women, due to biological conditions, 21 to 25%. 

However, it is important to keep in mind, besides the factors we have already mentioned such as genetics and life habits, that age is also highly related to these indexes, and it is normal that they naturally increase as the years go by. 

Remember, no exaggeration or miracle diets, ok? During your fitness process, count on Sooro Renner’s support, nutrition that generates results.