Up your hydration game.

Plain and simple, people don’t drink enough water.

As coaches, we see it everywhere. So many people leave much of their performance and health on the table because they simply don’t drink enough water.

What’s worse is that you are setting yourself up for failure later in life as your thirst mechanism starts to dwindle as you age.

Hydration is the name of the game - your whole life is a battle of keeping tissues hydrated. You’re born 75% water and die 65%. Death is largely your body drying out.

So the more you can stay hydrated when you’re younger is only going to help you age much better, with better joints, more supple muscles, and tissue that is much more vibrant.

What’s the best way to stay hydrated? Just drink a crap ton of water?

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NEGATIVE. We do not want nor need you to be that meathead who walks around with a big plastic gallon at all times and is going to the bathroom every 30 minutes to take a piss.

You should hydrate like an athlete. In order to do that, we need to make sure you have adequate electrolytes and the correct amount of water needed for YOUR body.

According to webmd, you require .5-1.0 oz of water per lbs of bodyweight.

We’re here to thrive, not survive, so naturally we are recommending 1.0 oz per lbs of body weight.

Let’s do some simple math. If you weigh 150 lbs, we want you to drink 150 oz of water.

Now let’s talk about your electrolyte consumption. One of the first things that happens when people start to up their hydration game is they start peeing. A lot. We’ve been there ourselves, and we’ve heard people say time and time again, “I can’t drink that much water, I will be running to the bathroom every 5 seconds!”

That’s what happens when you become hypohydrated - where your own body has to start pulling on it’s own electrolytes to absorb the water, so instead of allowing that to happen you just start passing it.

But we want absorption! We want your tissue to be silky, smooth, supple and juicy.

So here’s what you’re going to do. You’re going to splash some flavorless, no calorie, electrolytes in the water you drink between each of your meals. By doing this, you are making your water more isotonic, which is just fancy for saying the water is in a better state for easier absorption.

Our favorite electrolyte to add to our water is Hi Lyte. We are in no way affiliated with this product, everyone should consult their physician before adding any supplement to their diet. However, we use this product every single day and have been very happy with it.

Per 32 oz of water, you add .5 teaspoon of electrolyte solution which makes your water isotonic. Think of it like the saline solutions you get as an IV in the hospital.

Simple hydration hack? We like to find a tumblr that is very close to those units of measurement so we don’t need to constantly do math throughout the day.

For instance, I carry around this 36 oz yeti tumbler. So in between my meals I just fill one of these bad boys up with water and add my electrolytes to it.

Here’s a hydration schedule:

Our graphic is for someone who weighs 186 lbs like myself. You’d only have to tailor it to your total daily intake per lbs of bodyweight. Minor tweaks!

You’ll see that I don’t add in electrolytes with my meals because I am getting some in my food which is more than enough to help absorption.

Now why would you want to make sure that you hydrate this well?

Well for one - once you start to make your tissues more hydrated and create a new homeostasis for yourself, your thirst mechanism will be inclined to kick in quicker and more often if you don’t drink enough water. Simple terms: the more hydrated you are, the more your body craves water.

We see it all the time. Dehydrated people can eat really salty food without drinking that much water, if any. Now if you gave a really hydrated person that same meal they would be inclined to drink 2-3 cups of water with it to balance the salt out.

Your body will desire to keep homeostasis at that higher hydration level.

This will also help set you up for success in your later years because your body is used to drinking more water so you’ll still be inclined to drink more water than most people. Think about it. Your thirst naturally declines as you age, so if you are already dehydrated when you are young, that’s a recipe for drying out out real quick!

Why else would you want to be properly hydrated?

Even 1% of dehydration can equate to 6% less cardiac output. That means you are making it that much harder on your heart to pump blood, limiting how much blood can pass through your body with each pump, giving you an automatic disadvantage to anyone in any physical competition.

You are making any cardio activity way harder on yourself.

You’re already giving yourself a disadvantage in the playing field. Here’s the thing though - you cant just front load your water.

Say if you are a marathon runner and you know you’re going to need to be more hydrated for your race. Chugging a bunch of water 2 days before hand is not going to give you the ability to outperform the athlete who has trained the whole time with greater hydration.

I think it’s unfathomable that the thing we need the second most to survive, second to oxygen, is something that most people don’t prioritize.

Create a homeostasis that is designed to thrive, not survive.

Once you do, you will feel the difference and you’ll love it. You’ll look back and think how the hell could you have ever had only coffee and not water with breakfast. You won’t even be able to imagine what it was like when you drank 1 to 2 sodas each day.