Drinking properly during fitness training

Drinking is important. And when it comes to sports, even more important. And yet, for most people, the right amount of fluid intake plays only a minor role. Strength athletes, in particular, drink little or too little during training and often only reach for the water bottle when it is too late - when they get thirsty. This is because thirst is a warning that an acute fluid deficiency already exists.

Symptoms of dehydration include dry skin, dark urine, concentration problems, circulatory problems and headaches.

10 Water facts

The following facts illustrate how important correct drinking really is:

1. One person, lots of water - The human body consists of over 70 percent water.
2. In just one day a person loses an average of 230 ml of water through breathing alone. That is about a cup of water that we breathe out every day!
3. The brain, heart, lungs and muscles are particularly sensitive to water loss.
4. Every day - even without doing sports - a person loses about 2.5 litres of water.
5. Through food, humans consume about 1 litre of water per day.
6. Without physical exertion you should drink about 1.5 to 2 litres per day.
7. During heat or sports, the need for fluids increases rapidly due to sweating. Basically, the more trained you are, the more and faster you sweat.
8. During medium activity the body loses 0.5 to 1 litre of sweat per hour. During intense activity in heat, consumption can rise to as much as 3 litres per hour.
9. Already a fluid loss of 2% of the body weight (1.4 litres at 70 kg body weight) leads to a reduction of the oxygen transport into the muscles. These muscles tire faster and are less efficient. During sport, a fluid loss of 1 litre can lead to a 10% drop in performance.
10. With sweat, the body also loses minerals (so-called electrolytes) that it cannot produce itself. Therefore these must be replenished with food or drinks. An undersupply during sport reduces muscle strength and can lead to cramps.

Drinking properly

With the following tips you are on the safe side when it comes to drinking:

1. Drink approx. 0.5 litres directly before sport.
2. Drink approx. 0.1 to 0.2 litres every 20 minutes during sport, i.e. 0.5 to 1 litre per hour.
3. Drink in small sips.
4. Avoid ice-cold drinks. Temperatures of 5 to 10 degrees are ideal.
5. Balance your fluid balance immediately after exercise.

What are the best drinks before, during and after training?

The answer is quite simple: all drinks that contain not only the pure liquid but also the electrolytes lost through sweating. This would be the case with mineral water, for example. But most mineral drinks offered in fitness studios also serve this purpose. However, make sure that there is no sugar in them. The much-praised apple juice spritzer is rightly popular as a fitness drink, but can also - depending on the mixture - bring extra calories through the fruit sugar.

And what about drinking water from the tap? Also absolutely fine. Possibly missing minerals (drinking water varies greatly according to regional and local circumstances) are almost always taken up automatically with food.

How much should I drink?

By the way, you can determine your fluid requirements individually - and you can do it like this:

Weigh yourself undressed before and after the sport. The difference in kg plus the amount of fluid you drink during exercise corresponds to your fluid loss in litres.

Example:

weight before training: 80,0 kg

weight after training: 79,0 kg

Drinks during the training: 0,5 litres

Fluid requirement per training: 1.5 litres.

Too much fluid?

Often only the lack of fluid is addressed. But: You can also drink too much. And this can even have strong negative consequences.

If too much liquid is supplied to the body, it floats up. This means that the concentration of salt ions in the blood drops and the water is automatically drawn into the cells. So there is a shift in the electrolytes, also called water poisoning.

It is therefore important to know how much fluid is required by the individual. After all, drinking enough is vital, but drinking like a barn harvester can in turn be dangerous to health.