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Olympic athlete drops powerful 'BMI' response after viewer mocked her weight

No, she won't "just ignore the haters." 💪

@ilonamaher/Instagram

“BMI doesn’t tell you what I can do.”

It seems like at least once a year, the topic of “BMI,” or “body mass index,” being a flawed measuring system for fat mass and health comes up in conversation.

Experts will explain how BMI leads to an incomplete perspective at best—since it doesn't take into consideration several key factors that influence a person’s body composition—and at worst, actual health risks, affecting eligibility for things like weight loss medications, insurance rates, joint-replacement surgery and fertility treatment. And then life moves forward.

And yet, despite the constant debunking, the belief in BMI still marches on. And this time, it was hurled at the USA rugby star and Olympian Ilona Maher.

More specifically, someone commented “I bet that person has a 30% BMI” on one of Maher’s TikTok videos.

Could this person have simply been pointing out the inherent flaw of BMI? Saying that Maher, an elite athlete, would be considered “overweight” using this system? Perhaps. But this is the internet we’re dealing with, so Maher (and others) interpreted it to be an insult.

And under that context, Maher wasn’t having it, and chose "not to just ignore the haters."

“Hi, thank you for this comment. I think you were trying to roast me, but this is actually a fact. I do have a BMI of 30. Well, 29.3 to be exact,” Maher said in response video…which became something of a roast itself.

Maher talked about how she had been considered “overweight” her entire life, and even recalled being “so embarrassed” to turn in a physical form to the office which had “overweight” written on it.

“I chatted with my dietician, because I go off facts, and not just what pops up here. You know, like you do.” she quipped while tapping her temples.

Maher is 5-ft.-10-in. and 200 lbs, which is considered “overweight” by BMI standards. But as she explained, about 170 of those 200 pounds are “lean muscle mass.”

“Do that math in your head…you probably can’t,” Maher said sarcastically.

It’s easy to see through this example how bogus BMI really is, especially for athletes.

Essentially, “BMI doesn’t tell you what I can do.”

“It doesn’t tell you what I can do on the field. How fit I am. It’s just a couple of numbers put together,” she said. “It doesn’t tell you how much muscle I have, or anything like that.”

Maher concluded by faux lamenting, “I do have a BMI of 30. I am considered overweight. But alas, I am going to the Olympics, and you’re not.”

While Maher’s clapback was certainly satisfying, it also provided some much needed reassurance to folks. So many commented on how this outdated concept has affected (or still effects) their own body image of that of a loved one.

“How can I get my teenage daughter with a high BMI (but fit!) to understand this?! She feels shamed even at the doctor for her BMI.”

“Dancer here, I'll never forget at 13 being told I had the BMI of 24 of ‘overweight.’ I broke down and the nurse said it didn’t mean anything and all I could think was then WHY are you making me do this?!”

“I had to ask the doctor’s office to put a note on my child’s file to not bring up/talk about BMI in her check ups. It isn't an accurate representation of health!”

“Thank you for sharing your weight, bc seeing lbs numbers in different bodies has been so helpful in me loving mine. I’m nowhere near an athlete's body but damn, the numbers really do us in.”

Until a more affordable solution pops up, BMI will continue to rear its ugly head in doctor’s offices and in our psyches. Maybe this is a reminder that our bodies are so much more than height and weight every now and again is a good thing. And if it comes from an Olympian…even better.


This article originally appeared on 7.29.24

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A girl was asked about BMI on a test. Her answer was mic-droppingly great.

When an Indiana eighth-grader was asked about BMI in class, she took her teacher to school.

A few weeks before this student got a BMI assignment, every student in the class was weighed in front of their peers and made to calculate their BMI, or body mass index. According to the student's mother, her daughter came home in tears after the exercise. She's perfectly healthy, she eats well and she's active ... but according to her BMI, she was "obese."

Body mass index is known to be a pretty flawed system of measuring someone's weight in relation to their height. It often oversimplifies complex health issues by putting people into one of four categories — underweight, normal, overweight, or obese.

Which is why this student's frustration led her to do some extra writing on her class assignment about BMI.

Here's the question she had to answer:

She could have easily recited the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention definition of BMI in her answer:

"Body Mass Index (BMI) is a person's weight in kilograms divided by the square of height in meters. A high BMI can be an indicator of high body fatness. BMI can be used to screen for weight categories that may lead to health problems but it is not diagnostic of the body fatness or health of an individual."

And she could have easily just typed her measurements into one of the many online BMI calculators.

But she didn't. Instead, she gave an amazing explanation of exactly why BMI is an outdated, inaccurate way of measuring overall health. Here. I'll let her explain:

"BMI is an outdated way of defining normal weight, under weight, over weight, and obesity by taking one person's height divided by their weight. One of the formula's obvious flaws, explains Alan Aragon, the Men's Health Weight Loss Coach and nutritionist in California, is that it has absolutely no way of discriminating fat and muscle. So, let's say there is a fairly athletic woman who maintains a decent diet, she's five feet, six inches, and she weighs 190 pounds, but 80% of her body is muscle. That doesn't matter when calculating BMI! This woman's BMI would be 30.7, and she would be labeled obese. Does that make sense to you? Because it sure doesn't make sense to me."


"How could someone who stays fit, eats healthy, and has a low metabolism be in danger of heart disease and diabetes? Oh, that's right, because she isn't in danger of obesity and heart disease. This woman is active and healthy and she is the furthest thing from obese. In conclusion, BMI is an outdated way of determining a person's body health, and it's a measurement that should not be used in a school setting where students are already self-conscious and lacking confidence in their unique bodies."

"Now, I'm not going to even open my laptop to calculate my BMI. And I'll tell you why. Ever since I can remember, I've been a "bigger girl" and I'm completely fine with that; I'm strong and powerful. When you put a softball or a bat in my hand, they are considered lethal weapons. But, at the beginning of the year, I started having very bad thoughts when my body was brought into a conversation. I would wear four bras to try and cover up my back fat, and I would try to wrap ace bandages around my stomach so I would look skinnier. So my lovely mother did what any parent would do when they noticed something wrong with her child, she took me to my doctor. My doctor and I talked about my diet and how active I am."

"He did a couple tests and told me I was fine. He said though I'm a bit overweight, he's not going to worry about me based on how healthy I am. So this is where I don't calculate my BMI because my doctor, a man who went to college for eight years studying children's health, told me my height and weight are right on track. I am just beginning to love my body, like I should, and I'm not going to let some outdated calculator and a middle school gym teacher tell me I'm obese, because I'm not. My BMI is none of your concern because my body and BMI are perfect and beautiful just the way they are."

Mic drop.

GIF from "The Colbert Report."

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