After 18 months being trapped indoors, now is the perfect time for you and your children to join a sports team or club to get active and healthy before the winter sets in and we have to hunker back in our houses! This article can help you understand why hydration before, during and after sports is so critical for your well-being.
As many of us set out on our renewed quest to exercise, be healthy and participate in active and fun sports, it’s more important than ever to stay hydrated.
Hydration is key when playing on a sports team and to staying healthy as it can boost your immune system and keep your body functioning effectively.
Outdoor activity and sports clubs for adults and children alike is a great way to put the fun into fitness – but it requires paying special attention to hydration.
As Brittany Wehrle, a performance dietitian with the Children’s Health℠ Andrews Institute Sports Performance powered by EXOS states: “Staying hydrated increases energy, improves movement, recovery and agility, thermoregulation, and aids in mental clarity and activity – all of which can improve physical performance and reduce the risk of injuries.”
Thus it is clear that when participating in sports hydration is absolutely vital!
“Almost every measurement of performance – aerobic endurance, strength, power, speed, agility and reaction time – decreases with as little as 2% dehydration,” explains Wehrle.
Around 60% of your body is water and it plays a vital role in every bodily function. You can lose a lot of fluid when you exercise – as much as a litre or two an hour – mainly through sweating and breathing. So you’ll need to drink more when you exercise.
When it’s warm, your body sweats more to help you cool down. And depending on the temperature, humidity, and the nature of your activity, you might not even realize how much you are perspiring.
Don’t rely on thirst alone to tell you how much you need to drink. To keep those muscles working and avoid fatigue; it’s extremely important to drink plenty of liquids before, during, and after the activity.
For most outdoor activities, good old filtered water does the trick. If your activity lasts an hour or more, fruit juice diluted with filtered water will provide carbohydrates for energy plus minerals to replace lost electrolytes (sodium, potassium, magnesium) in your sweat.
If you don’t top this fluid back up, you can become dehydrated. This can affect both your general health and how well you can exercise. You’ll feel tired more quickly if you’re dehydrated, and you won’t be able to control your temperature as well as usual.
While drinking enough water may seem like a simple action, it impacts virtually every aspect of sports performance. Water helps fuel your muscles, so drinking before, during and after exercise will boost your energy levels, and may help to prevent cramp.
Fluid needs vary based on activity, intensity, environmental conditions, body size of the athlete and training status. The more highly trained an athlete is, the more they will sweat and require more water.
To maintain optimal hydration throughout the day, young athletes should drink ½ to 1 ounce of water per pound of body weight. To maintain peak performance during exercise, minimize water weight loss to no more than 2% of your body weight.
Wehrle encourages athletes to drink plenty of water in the hours leading up to practice. Continue taking four to six big gulps of water every 15 to 20 minutes during exercise. After exercising, drink 24 ounces of water for every pound of water weight you lose during your workout.
Top tip! You should calculate your sweat rate!
Knowing an athlete’s sweat rate is important when monitoring hydration. Sweat rate is the amount or rate at which a person sweats. To calculate sweat rate, measure weight before and after a workout. The difference in the weight indicates how well the athlete is staying hydrated and whether it’s within the healthy guidelines. The weight difference plus any fluids consumed during workout equals the sweat rate. Understanding this number will guide the amount of fluid needed during the workouts or practices.
By following our top tips on how to stay hydrated, you too can reap the manifold health benefits of hydration.
This is especially crucial when getting back into exercising by engaging in sporting activities.
Therefore to ensure your families health and hydration when taking part in post lockdown sport activities, we recommend you invest in a ZeroWater filter. You can choose from the wide variety of styles on our website. ZeroWater is here to ensure that you are hydrated and healthy when participating in sports!
At ZeroWater we have created the most advanced, affordable water filters on the market! All to make sure that you can be your optimal, healthy and hydrated self while exercising and taking part in sports clubs.
2 stage filters only contain Activated Carbon and Ion Exchange Resin, while our filters contain 3 other stages (a Coarse Filter Screen, a Foam Distributor and a Ultra-fine screen & non-woven membrane layers).
This means that these 2 stage filters only remove around half of all the dissolved solids in your water and therefore the taste will not be as pure as what ZeroWater filters can provide. You can read our previous article for a detailed explanation on how our Premium 5 Stage Ion Exchange water filters work!
When tested in accordance with the NSF’s protocol based on a 40 gallon filtration (double the rated usage), ZeroWater reduces 97% of Lead and 99.9% of Chromium from tap water. They are also third party tested to reduce 96% of Mercury, 93% of Arsenic and 99% of Copper, among many other contaminants!
So if your taking up a new sporting activity and want to ensure you’re optimally hydrated on your quest for fitness, ZeroWater is here for you. ZeroWater wants to offer you a helping hand on your hydration and health journey.
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