Best Indicator Of Healthy Weight

I recently purchased the Omron Full Body Sensor  to track my weight and body fat. It tracks a bunch of other stuff as well, buy I mainly focus on those two.  There is debate on the accuracy, but the scale is consistent.  This allows me to track changes.  I do weight myself first thing in the morning, but may add a second weight right before I go to bed.  I did ask a question regarding hydration on Beginner Triathlete and received some great responses there as well.  One of the responses included links to articles that actually tested the scales against a Bod Pod analysis (which is considered the most accurate).  Unfortunately my scale wasn't included, buy that's fine.  A link to the articles:

Test #1
Test #2
Test #3 

Below is a graph from Test #2 that summarizes the test.  These numbers are average percent differences when compared to the Bod Pod.  The 'A' and 'N' refer to 'Athlete Mode' and 'Normal Mode'.   The averages are based on nine individuals tested.

The one factor that should be noted is that these averages don't take into account individual differences.  Some athletes were over 10% different while others under 1%.  Below is a quote from Test #2:

"Perhaps the most important aspect in this entire two part series is the one I haven’t mentioned yet: Consistency is more important than accuracy.  Meaning, if your scale consistently measures your fat at a given level and changes as you do things to affect it (increase or decrease) – that’s more important than having a one time scientific measurement that’s accurate.  In an ideal world these electrical impedance scales would be more accurate.  But they simply aren’t across a wide spectrum of individuals.

So what’s my recommendations?  Well, get a scale that you like (be it because of the color of the scale, or its features) – and focus on one of three things: Making the number go up, staying the same, or going down.  Don’t focus on the body fat number itself unless you have something more scientific to baseline it against.  Yes it may be great to boast the single-digit body fat, but the reality is out of a room of really dang looking fit people – only two people fell in that category (interestingly, one was nearly 200 pounds)." - Source

Please read on:

With all that said, I'd like to add another method I read about in Men's Health Magazine (Feb. 2012).  Unfortunately I don't have a link to the article since I only subscribe to paper magazine not online version.  Per Dr. George Blackburn, MD, PhD, associate director of Harvard medical schools division of nutrition, individuals should calculate their waist to hip ratio.  This measurement can help indicate the level of visceral fat, the dangerous belly fat linked to heart disease, diabetes and cancer.  To do this, wrap a tape measure around your waist between your lowest rib and hip bone.  Then wrap the tape around the largest part of your hips, which is usually around the butt.  Divide the waist number by the hip number.  Aim for a number below .9.

Further, the doctor goes on to say you should measure you weight to height ratio as well.  Per the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, this ratio is better than BMI, waist circumference, or waist to hip ratio for predicting your risk of heart attack, stroke or death from heart disease.  Aim for a waist/height ratio of .05.