Hydration and Athletic Performance

The purpose of this page is is to offer information on hydration and its effects on athletic performance, and ultimately on health.

Water is the most essential nutrient for the body. In fact, you can survive longer without food than without water. It plays an important role in digestion, circulation, waste removal, building cells, transporting other nutrients, and maintaining normal body temperature. Your blood plasma is primarily water and is responsible for transporting amino acids and glucose to your muscles to help rebuild the muscles and aid in muscle contraction.

Water makes up approximately 65% of total body weight. When you play tennis or train, your body sweats to help keep cool. As you perspire, your body loses water as well as some electrolytes, so you should replenish your body with water or some type of fluid.

So you have probably heard that you should drink at least 8-10- ounce of water per day. However, everybody is different, so your intake needs may vary based on your size and how active you are. This guidelines can help you to see more specifically how much water you need:

Dehydration is the loss of water and sodium essential for normal body function and occurs when the body loses more fluid than it takes in. It also diminishes energy and impairs performance and poses a risk for heat exhaustion which can raise the risk of heat stroke, a potentially life threatening condition.

The most critical nutrition intervention for all players is adequate fluid intake making their capacity to train, compete and recover successfully.

Therefore it is important to drink before, during and after exercise to regulate your body temperature and to replace fluids lost form sweat to stay hydrated without over drinking. Also, liberally salting foods and drinking sport drinks containing electrolytes. Diet plays also a vital role to the body. Eating a meal ensures full hydration as it promotes fluid intake and retention.

On the other hand, hyponatremia is a condition of hyper hydration. This occurs in tennis players who over drink water to treat or prevent heat cramps.

The treatment for heat cramps is consuming fluid with sodium, no plain water, as muscle cramps are usually caused by low sodium levels. Over hydration happens because humans are capable of drinking at faster rates than the kidney can process the excess fluids. That extra water in the body dilutes the sodium concentration in the blood. While playing, blood is diverted from the kidneys to the heart and working muscles, and urine production is less.

In addition, sweat rates increases during exercise causing dilution of sodium in the blood. So the combination of water retention, and sodium dilution causes hyper hydration, a potentially life threatening condition.

What you need to know about sports drinks:

Water is a good thirst quencher, however, a poor re-hydrator. Studies have proven that that water, when compared to sports drinks, replaces approximately ½ (half)of the fluids lost during an event.

Sports drinks provide fluid, carbohydrates and electrolytes, all important for hydration. Sodium in sports drinks are scientifically formulated to retain fluids, requiring fewer bathroom breaks than hydrating with plain water.

Carbohydrates in sports drinks provide fuel (energy) for the muscles and brain, improving athletic performance. That means also that you can work at higher intensity for a longer duration while consuming sports drinks. So there should be no concern of caloric intake as most of the carbohydrates are burned during the activity.

A properly formulated sports drink can maximize gastric emptying (the process by which the fluid leaves your stomach) and speeds absorption (the movement of nutrients through the intestinal wall into the blood) of carbohydrates, sodium and fluids into the bloodstream. Please note that drinks containing large amounts of carbohydrates (>8% - less than 8 percent) and carbonation should be avoided, as they cause less absorption and delay gastric emptying, resulting in distress.

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In conclusion, it is imperative to understand the benefits of proper hydration to help you perform your best on the court and obtaining better health. Whatever daily diet you choose to follow, reevaluate it often and make changes that will best suit your training and playing style.

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