Login | June 19, 2025
What your bathroom scale isn’t telling you
PETE GLADDEN
Pete’s World
Published: March 10, 2025
You’ve probably heard that oftentimes despite all of our cardio exercising we might not actually see weight loss expressed on the scale.
Yet we’ve been told time and again that we’d still likely experience a loss of fat tissue.
Well, when I’ve related this well-established truism to clients they sometimes look at me rather quizically, wondering out loud how it is that they could loose fat weight but not see that expressed on the bathroom scale as weight lost.
So let me tell you about yet another study that’s once again confirming this misunderstood fitness phenomenon.
The study I’m referring to, “Effects of 1,144 km of road cycling performed in 7 days: A cardiometabolic imaging study,” was published in the September 2024 issue of the American Journal of Physiology-Endocrinology and Metabolism. And in this study researchers found that fat loss can’t always be viewed simply as pounds lost on the scale.
Now before letting the cat out of the bag and revealing exactly what’s happening, let’s first briefly go through this study.
So the research trial went like this.
A group of 11 male recreational cyclists ages 50-66 years were recruited to ride a staggering 700 miles in a week’s time.
During this period their blood pressures, resting heart rates, cholesterol and blood sugar levels, levels of inflammatory markers and body fat percentages were monitored on each and every cycling day.
During their seven days of extreme endurance cycling the group was instructed to try to maintain a stable body weight.
And to accomplish this they were given unlimited access to buffet breakfasts and lunches as well as boxed dinners and snacks to take home with them in the evenings.
What’s more, all foods the cyclists ate which were provided were accounted for nutritionally by the food’s packaging.
And finally, the cyclists were encouraged to increase their food and drink intake to prevent significant weight loss and dehydration.
So what did the researchers find?
Okay, so after 700+ miles of cycling (and I can vouch for the fact that a 700-mile week is a massive calorie burner) one would almost assuredly assume that there’d be a very detectable weight loss on the scales.
But there wasn’t.
As a matter of fact the group lost only about 1% of their body weight, yet they dropped an average of 1.26 inches off their waist sizes.
Another interesting finding was that the group actually lost a bit over 9% of their overall body fat mass (assessed by magnetic resonance imaging) - which included a 14.6% reduction in visceral fat (fat around the organs) - while at the same time they gained 1.2% lean muscle tissue.
And as an aside they reduced their total cholesterol by 20% and decreased their triglyceride levels by nearly 40%.
Blood pressure was also substantially reduced.
So here is yet another study that seems to confirm the thesis that a very simple apparatus like the bathroom scale isn’t the best measure of the changes that take place in our bodies when we partake in exercise programs, whether the exercise is at the extreme volume end of the spectrum - as in this study - or at the lower volume end of the spectrum as in other studies.
And as for an answer to that “what’s happening?” question. It’s simple: Some lean muscle mass is being added to the body while at the same time some fat mass is being subtracted.
Thus, such body compositional changes might not even register on the scale as any kind of loss in bodyweight.
Now even more important here is the fact that some of that fat which was lost was of the visceral variety - a very harmful type of body fat.
Visceral fat accumulates in and around those normally lean organs such as the heart and the liver, and it’s almost impossible to detect without the use of MRI technology.
Subcutaneous fat (fat under the skin) on the other hand, can be measured externally with simple skin-fold calipers.
The authors conclude their study by stating, “These findings once again emphasize the need to go beyond weight loss to fully evaluate changes in body composition induced by whichever endurance exercise intervention. Furthermore, they support the importance of promoting a physically active lifestyle rather than caloric restriction in obesity prevention, the latter being quite difficult to follow in the current socioeconomic environment where highly processed, energy-dense foods are omnipresent.”