Monday, December 18, 2006

I wanna be overwieght? WTF?

Why do I want to be overweight?

Well, there are a bunch of reasons. But first, what does the term overweight mean?

Medical science (vastly over-) smplifies measuring acceptable levels of weight using a value known as BMI - body mass index. It's your weight, in kilos, divided by the square of your height.

So, 6 foot, 2 inches is 1.88metres. 19 stone 7 is 124 kilos.

124 divided by 1.88 divided by 1.88 is 35, more or less.

The scale basically defines a BMI of less than 20 to be underweight, 20 to 25 as healthy, 25 to 30 as overweight but not at risks to your health, 30 to 40 as obese, and 40 and over as morbidly obese. So I'm officially obese. Yeah, I'm a fat bastard. I've been called worse.

My experience is that these figures err on the low side, unless you have a very small build. According to this I should weigh in at 13st. 13, or 89 kilos. I'd look like I'd been dug up and warmed up. They acknowledge that BMI is inaccurate for athletes and pregnant women, but not that you might actually just be wider than average even with no body fat.

SWMBO, who has been following the Weight Watchers (WW) plan for 3 years, thinks I'd look pretty sexy around 16 stone. (I think I was about 17-18 stone when we met, 11 years ago).

So with a BMI of 30, I'd be ... grabs calculator ... 16 stone 9. That's exactly 40lbs to lose.

That would just get me into the overweight category. It represents losing about 14.5% of my current weight. WW sets 10% as an initial acheivable target for new recruits.

So, 40 and 30 are the magic numbers. Lose 40lbs to acheive a BMI of 30. If and when I get there, I'll worry about whether it's the right place to be.

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