Paleo Diet and Paleolithic Diet Questions & Answers

Question

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I've been doing Crossfit 3x a week since January. My gym started a paleo challenge Feb 1. I started at 145 and 32ish percent body fat (27 y/o female 5'3'') I was really freaked out about my body fat, having previously been in the 24% range about a year ago. We just did final weigh ins for the challenge, and I'm down 5 lbs however my bodyfat percentage is only down 2%.

Does this mean I'm not building much muscle at Crossfit? Eating too much fat? Doing something wrong? or is this a normal % to loose in about 6 weeks? Suggestions on getting this number down more?

(Im probably 90% paleo-cream in my coffee, some dark chocolate, couple drinks on weekends)

flag	asked Mar 16 2012 at 16:12 shaderade 21●1

How do your clothes fit? If your clothes fit better you have lost fat and gained muscle. – Don Mar 16 2012 at 16:56

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Probably water weight. – Travis Culp♦ Mar 16 2012 at 16:59

How did they measure your body fat? There really aren't that many accurate body fat measurement devices out there unless you do the water displacement one or get one of those fancy shmancy super expensive body scans... – Susan Mar 16 2012 at 17:08

I was measured with calipers...which they did say tend to be a bit inaccurate. The scale has been steady at 140 for the past few weigh ins, but would water weight affect BF perfecentage? I don't know much about it..only that it can be hard to get accurate readings. – shaderade Mar 16 2012 at 17:31

2% is within the margin of error and water weight can be reflected in skinfold thickness (it is for me). – Travis Culp♦ Mar 16 2012 at 18:52

Beth · Answer 1 · 2012-03-16 16:48:35Z UTC

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Sometime the method used to calculate body fat is not accurate. Calipers can be off, scales that give a body fat number can be off because of dehydration, etc.

You may have lost visceral fat, around the organs.

answered Mar 16 2012 at 16:48

Beth
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Nance · Answer 2 · 2012-03-16 17:05:01Z UTC

Besides water weight and inaccuracies, you should consider metabolism and other possible factors. I think the current status of your metabolism, which is driven as much by quality of rest and stress level as much as by what you eat, dictates where fat is stored and if/when it is released.

If you seem well-adapted to burning stored fat--you can easily go long intervals between meals and maintain high energy--then I'd evaluate your duration and quality of sleep as well as your recent stress levels.

For fat loss, the whole package has to be pretty well tuned in those of us with a tendency to store fat for "tough times."

Paleo Challenge Results: lbs decrease but not body fat..why?

2 Answers