Tracking fitness goals and health using our InBody scale

What’s the InBody scan all about?

Since the start of this month, we’ve added something new to Kracht Amsterdam, the InBody scan. It’s a powerful tool that gives you detailed insights into your body composition (muscle, fat, bone density, water etc.), helping you track progress, understand your health on a deeper level, and fine-tune your goals with real data. You can now book your scan with one of our trainers!

At Kracht, we know that health and fitness are about more than numbers. It’s how you move, how you feel, how well you recover, and how much energy you bring to life. But we also believe in the power of measuring what matters. Tracking measurable features can be motivating, eye-opening, and incredibly empowering, building long-term results through making small changes tangible.

This article is a practical guide to how the InBody scan works, what the data can tell you about your health, performance, and progress and how you can use it to your advantage. We’ll also look at a few common use-cases and how to act on your results, so the numbers don’t just sit on paper, but help steer your next step forward.

What is an InBody scan?

In short, it’s a very fancy scale. The InBody technology scans different segments of your body (arms, legs, trunk) and then breaks your weight into components like fat mass, skeletal muscle mass, body water, minerals, etc.

Why does this matter? Because, just weight doesn’t tell us much. Two people weighing exactly the same could have totally different compositions, one filled with muscle and low fat, another with less muscle and more fat. The scan gives you the full picture, not just the number on the scale. It can help you build muscle, lose fat or track health measures.

How can you use it? By regularly checking in on these measurements, you can get an accurate image of how your training and current lifestyle are impacting your body. Are you gaining muscle? Stabilizing in weight? Losing Fat? And how do you compare against the average? All relevant questions that can help you lock in on certain goals and habits!

Key results to focus on

Here are the main things you’ll see on your scan results sheet and how we at Kracht suggest you interpret them:

• Skeletal Muscle Mass (SMM) – How much of your body is lean tissue (muscle).

  • Why it matters: More muscle means more strength, greater metabolic rate, better performance in WODs, and improved durability. Additionally, especially at an older age. More muscle usually means better health

  • Track it over time: If SMM rises while body fat drops or holds steady, you’re building good quality tissue and likely improving your strength and health.

  • How to improve: Focus and track your performance in the strength piece of class. Consider going to the special strength or Olympic lifting classes (ADD LINK). Make sure your nutrition supports your training. Focus on getting enough protein and total calories throughout the day.

• Body Fat Mass / Percent Body Fat (PBF) – How much of your weight is fat.

  • Why it matters: Excess fat can hamper performance, slow you down, increase injury risk, and affect your health long-term.

  • Track it: If PBF gradually drops and muscle mass stays stable or even increases, you’re on the right track.

  • How to improve: Combine your Kracht training with smart nutrition (moderated energy balance, adequate protein) and regularly scheduled conditioning sessions.

    
    

• Visceral Fat / Obesity Analysis – The fat around internal organs (often flagged as a separate metric).

  • Why it matters: High visceral fat links with a greater risk of metabolic and cardiovascular issues.

  • Track it: Ideally, over time, we see these drop to accepted levels, indicating improved health and lifestyle

  • How to improve: Increase your aerobic base (Zone 1/2 conditioning) and manage diet by focusing on healthy food choices. Reduce stress and improve sleep; these help reduce visceral fat.

    
    

• Body Water / ECW/TBW Ratio – Total body water, and the ratio between extracellular water (ECW) and total body water (TBW).

  • Why it matters: A higher ECW/TBW ratio may indicate inflammation or fluid retention rather than good recovery.

  • What to do: Ensure proper hydration, recovery, and reduce inflammation via sleep, nutrition, and mobility work.

Real-world use-cases: What to do with your results

Use-case 1: Your goal is “leaner & stronger”

• Here your InBody is mainly fat mass. Seeing the fat mass drop will mean you’re leaning out. The stronger part is obviously best tracked in class, yet you might expect some muscle gain too (SMM going up).

• Action plan: Dial-in nutrition at a slight calorie deficit + protein at 1.8-2.2 g/kg bodyweight. And stay consistent with working out. Keep track of your lifts in class. Be mindful of recovery to aid performance in class.

• Re-scan after 8-12 weeks: evaluate lean mass (SMM), and body fat (PBF). And evaluate class performance.

Use-case 2: You’re trying to gain Skeletal Muscle Mass (SMM)

• Skeletal Muscle Mass (SMM) is the primary marker to track. Now, do keep an eye on Percentage of Body Fat too. This sometimes comes up when one starts increasing calories to support extra lean mass a bit too enthusiastically.

• Action plan: Use the Resting Metabolic Rate from the InBody to determine calorie and protein intake. Focus on strength training/classes and make sure to be in a calorie 200-300kcal surplus.

• Re-scan every 8-12 weeks to track changes in SMM and monitor any changes in PBF. If it’s not going fast enough, re-evaluate protein and calorie intake and access training quality.

  
  

Use-case 3: You’re preparing for a performance event (like the Ergathlon, row + bike test)

• If you have no body-composition goals, the InBody can still be a great tool. Make sure to fine tune nutrition based on current stats, and with an endurance event like this you sometimes risk losing some muscle mass due to the big calorie requirement. Use the results to check if you’re not starting to lose any muscle mass.

• Action plan: Use the Resting Metabolic Rate from the InBody to determine calorie intake and fine-tune total proteins. Track both performance and body metrics.

• Re-scan every 8-12 weeks during training: check balanced improvement. If muscle mass is starting to drop, adjust calories

  
  

Use-case 4: Your goal is “health & longevity”

• Here we’re trying to get all metrics into an optimal range. Slightly more of the focus should be on the visceral fat and body water section. But we also keep an eye out for muscle mass & fat.

• Action plan: Stay consistent with training, start prioritizing healthy food, improve sleep, optimize recovery, and try to lower any external stress.

• Re-scan: monitor potential reductions in visceral fat + improved water balance ratio.

Tips for getting the most from your scan

• Consistency matters: Always scan under similar conditions (same time of day, similar hydration, after a rest day rather than a heavy session).

• Focus on trends, not single readings: The history graph on your result sheet shows changes over time; this is your real story.

• Use the data to inform decisions: Instead of guessing if you’re “on track,” let the numbers tell you whether to increase volume, tweak nutrition, or emphasize recovery.

• Celebrate progress: Losing weight, gaining muscle, and/or changing habits is not easy, so celebrate wins! This will keep you motivated to push on.

• Don’t obsess over perfection: Progress is rarely linear. Use the scan as a tool, not a source of anxiety.

Final thoughts

The InBody scan gives you a window into more than just weight. We believe that this can help us to optimize training and add to our journey. We train hard, we train together, and enjoy the process. Using data like this doesn’t change that; it help to put even more purpose into training by allowing you to track how things like body fat, muscle mass and other health metrics evolve over time.

Ready to book your next scan? Talk to your coach, schedule your appointment, and let’s use your numbers as fuel for the next phase of your journey.