Hydration and Athletic Performance |
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| Performance can be significantly impaired when >2% body weight is lost through sweat. When a 70 kg athlete loses >1.4 kg of body weight during exercise (2%), performance is often significantly decreased. Further, weight loss >4% of body weight during exercise may lead to heat-related illness, and possibly death |
| The normal sweat rate of athletes ranges from 0.5–2.0 L/h depending on temperature, humidity, exercise intensity, and sweat response to exercise |
| To maintain fluid balance and prevent dehydration, athletes need to ingest 0.5–2 L/h of fluid in order to offset weight loss. This requires frequent ingestion of 6–8 oz of cold water or sports drink every 5–15 min. during exercise. |
| Athletes should not depend on thirst to prompt them to drink because people do not typically get thirsty until they have lost a significant amount of fluid through sweat. |
| Athletes should consider weighing themselves prior to and following exercise training to ensure that they maintain proper hydration. They should consume 3 cups of water for every lb. lost during exercise to adequately rehydrate themselves. Athletes should train themselves to tolerate drinking greater amounts of water during training and make sure that they consume more fluid in hotter/more humid environments. |
| Preventing dehydration during exercise is one of the most effective ways to maintain exercise capacity. |
| Inappropriate and excessive weight loss techniques (e.g., cutting weight in saunas, wearing rubber suits, severe dieting, vomiting, using diuretics) are extremely dangerous and should be prohibited. Making weight through dehydration techniques also causes one to compromise performance. |
Where are your Clinical Trials?
It has proven to be difficult, if not impossible, to proceed to full-scale randomized controlled trials (RCTs) for most of the natural methods that cannot be patented or otherwise monopolized.
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