Posted on February 14, 2014 by Jenny Cromack

I’ve been a personal trainer in Leeds for many years and many of my personal training clients would call themselves weight loss clients. Even I used the term weight loss client when I first started personal training, however these days, depending on their goals I’d much rather call them body composition clients or fat loss clients than weight loss clients.

After all, fat is what these clients are surely looking to lose…your body weight is made up of many things including bones, skin and organ tissue, fat tissue and the all important muscle tissue – not that any of the other stuff isn’t important! In fact, fat in the right quantities is also important for the body to function correctly.

In addition to losing fat, my clients often want to look better and see an improvement in their body composition and physique. And quite frankly, I’d rather a client be proud of how they look and how healthy they are than just be able to say they weigh a certain amount. We shouldn’t just be obsessed with a number on the scales because some of that 2lb you have lost this week may actually be from muscle tissue and that is not a healthy way to lose weight. We need a full picture of what is happening and therefore me and the motive8 team of personal trainers in Leeds also look at things such as skinfold measurements to analyse body fat and body composition, in addition to measuring our clients inches.

I find inches and circumference measurements fascinating! This week I have measured all of my wellness group I run on a Wednesday, in 6 weeks the average weight loss has been 8lb, however the group have lost anywhere between 6-9 inches each which is amazing! Some of group have lost 2 inches from around their waists and this is when those jeans start to feel better, or even begin to fall down a little! With inch loss like this their clothes all feel a little looser, and what was really refreshing was that some of the group started talking about how much more energy they had, how they were sleeping better, their nails and complexion had improved….. this was music to my ears, for once, people thinking about the bigger picture rather than just a number on the scales!

I also measured one of my PT clients this morning, and whilst she hadn’t achieved the weight loss goal we had set, she had still lose 6 inches and had said how she was fitting into clothes that had been too tight for her. From chatting to her I could see that this change in her inch loss was motivating enough for her, whereas if we had just focused on her weight this would have been quite demotivating.

Despite the fact that I have been a personal trainer in Leeds for many years, I still can’t guess people’s weight , yet I could look at someone who has been working hard in their sessions and say how fantastic they look due to dropping inches. So folks, whilst you may want to jump on the scales every week to keep your weight in check, don’t let this be the ‘be all and end all’….think about how you look, how you feel and your energy levels and let these be the deciding points about whether your workouts are getting the results you want.