Body Fat for Athletes!!

The one outstanding anthropometric characteristic of successful competitors in all running/cycling events is a low body fat content. The textbooks tell us that the body fat stores account for about 15-18% of total body weight in normal young men, and in young women the figure is about 25-30%.

However that fact is not a licence simply to go out and shed the pounds. You don’t want to be too thin an athlete, believe it or not.

That’s because our fat stores are important and the fat cells play many key roles. As well as acting as a reserve of energy that can be called upon at times of need, fat is important in the structure of tissues, in hormone metabolism, and in providing a cushion that protects other tissues. Moreover, there’s good evidence that the immune system is impaired when body fat stores are too low. A reduced ability to fight infections means more interruptions to training and more chance of being sick on race day.

And for female athletes, there are some very immediate consequences of a low body fat level, including especially a fall in circulating oestrogen levels. This in turn can lead to a loss of bone mass, causing problems for women in later life through an increased risk of bone fracture.