Minimum Body Fat - Exercise & Fitness Message Board

OutToLunch · 04-27-2006, 08:36 AM

Is there such a thing as an absolute minimum amount of fat that an adult must have? I don't mean body fat percentage. I'm taking about an actual amount. Two men could have 5% body fat, but if one weighs 200 pounds and the other weighs 150 pounds, then obviously the heavier guy also has more body fat. Right now I'm carrying less than 20 pounds of body fat, which sounds good, but because I don't have a lot of muscle mass, as a percentage of total weight, my body fat is higher than I'd like. I'm just wondering if there comes a point where it's more important to focus on how many pounds of fat you're carrying and less on what percentage it is of your total body weight. To get my body fat percentage really low, I'd have to be carrying only 10 pounds of fat on my frame, which seems like it might be too low.

senoflys · 04-27-2006, 10:15 AM

I may be wrong on this but isn't it all relative? 10% bodyfat for a 200 lb guy is obvioulsy different than for a 150 lb guy but it is still 10% no matter how you slice it. For a person to see their abs you usually have to have below 10% bodyfat, so that means that the 150 lb guy with six pack will have about 12-15 lbs of bodyfat meanwhile the 250 lb guy with a 6 pack will have about 20-25 lbs of bodyfat. No matter how you look at it is 10% but still different actual weight. I guess what I am trying to say is that No, there isn't such a thing as too low of bodyfat in terms of weight as long as the percentages align. And I changed the values to 10% because 5% bodyfat is extremely low and virtually impossible for most people.

OutToLunch · 04-28-2006, 07:29 AM

Part of the reason I brought up this question is because as a person gets really lean, their face starts to look gaunt. Let's say a person starts out weighing 150 pounds and has 5% body fat. That means they're carrying 7.5 pounds of fat. Now let's say they somehow pack on a lot of muscle and reach an overall weight of 200 pounds, but they keep their body fat at 5%. Despite having the same body fat percentage, the person is now carrying more total body fat, an extra 2.5 pounds in this case. I'm just wondering if that person's face will look less gaunt now that they've gained fat even though their body fat percentage has remained the same. Being lean is great, but it seems to come at the expense of a youthful face.

Willapp · 04-28-2006, 07:50 AM

I think the answer is no. Your bodyfat % comes from all over your body, so I would assume having the same bf % would give a similar appearance regardless of overall weight - bear in mind that weight is dependant on lots of things such as height. Someone who is 6' 5 and weighs 200 will have more total bodyfat than someone who is only 5'8 and weights 120, even if their bf % is the same.

This is the reason that, when considering bodyfat, it is usually done as a percentage as this has more meaning than total bodyfat - you can be pretty sure that two people with 5% bodyfat (extremely low) will look similarly gaunt, whereas two people with 10lbs bodyfat could be completely different due to their different builds.

OutToLunch · 04-28-2006, 11:30 AM

See I would tend to think it would make a difference. If a person gains fat regardless of whether their body fat percentage remains the same, that fat has to be deposited somewhere. And even though a person can't control where they gain fat, it's hard to believe that none of that additional fat would end up in their face.