When Robbie Earl and Joe Pavelski are flying down the ice, just about everyone in the Kohl Center, from coaches to Crease Creatures, is hoping for the same thing: the next score. Everyone, that is, except for the UW men's hockey athletic trainer, Andy Hrodey. Though he is as much in favor of a win for the Badgers as anyone else, he hopes first and foremost that his players are hydrated.
Probably the most important thing [in playing a sport] is being hydrated before practices and competitions, because you lose so many electrolytes and minerals when you work out,\ Hrodey said.
As useful as water is for replenishing electrolytes and minerals lost during intense exercise, however, it is also necessary for those of us who are not star hockey players, as well. According to Cynthia Haq, professor of family medicine and population health sciences, water is ""absolutely fundamental to our life; it is in each and every cell of the body, and it is also in the fluids, the blood, the plasma … everything that happens in our body requires water, essentially.""
Since approximately 75 percent of the human body is made up of water, it is difficult for most people to drink too much. ""Water regulates the body's temperature, cushions and protects vital organs and aids the digestive system,"" according the Healthy Hydration guide from the American Council on Exercise. Therefore, the guide continues, we must constantly replace the water we lose doing basic activities every day.
""Basic activities"" is a term that is slightly vague, however; people lose water not only when they sweat and urinate, but also when they are doing absolutely nothing. ""Most people don't realize that just in the process of breathing, we lose water. The air that we inhale is humidified by the lungs,"" Haq said. ""Even if you're just sitting there doing nothing, by breathing, you're losing fluid.""
So, depending on the intensity of a game or practice, the humidity of the Kohl Center environment and the amount of breathing that, say, a hockey player is planning on doing in one hour, his body could, according to the ACE guide, lose more than a quart of water. The National Research Council's recommended daily intake of water is 2.7 liters for women and 3.7 liters for men per day. While healthy people can technically get away with drinking less, they should drink more when exercising to avoid dehydration.
While many are under the impression that we should be drinking eight eight-ounce glasses of water per day, ""This recommendation … is a bit of a myth that's not well-grounded in science, unfortunately,"" Haq said.
Since there is some water in just about everything from milk and juice to soda and coffee, eight glasses of straight water could get a bit excessive.
The ACE guide goes on to site that ""even small amounts of water loss may hinder athletic performance."" What is worse, for those of us who are not Robbie Earl, ""in a dehydrated state the body is unable to cool itself, leading to heat exhaustion and possibly heat stroke. Without an adequate supply of water, the body will lack energy and muscles may develop cramps.""
Despite these negative effects, dehydration during exercise is still a common problem.
""Even though we have a natural thirst response when exercising, most individuals do not drink enough water before, during, and after activity to adequately replace the fluids lost,"" said Jenna Draeger, second-year physical therapy student at UW-Madison and certified personal trainer. ""In fact, most people only replace about two-thirds of the fluids they need.""
So, without the ""eight glasses of eight"" rule, how does Earl know how to avoid dehydration? For those of us who do not have athletic trainers, weighing ourselves before and after workouts to calculate water loss can be a bit excessive, so Hrodey had another recommendation: ""We tell our guys to look at the color of their urine—most people know this—if their urine is really yellow, then that means they need to drink more.""
Dehydration comes up in many other forms. Haq and Hrodey cited, in ascending order of seriousness: dizziness, disorientation, cramping, constipation, poor blood circulation and cell-function shutdown.
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