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Review
. 2019 Jul 9;11(7):1550.
doi: 10.3390/nu11071550.

Practical Hydration Solutions for Sports

Luke N Belval  1 , Yuri Hosokawa  2 , Douglas J Casa  3 , William M Adams  4 , Lawrence E Armstrong  5 , Lindsay B Baker  6 , Louise Burke  7 , Samuel Cheuvront  8 , George Chiampas  9 , José González-Alonso  10 , Robert A Huggins  3 , Stavros A Kavouras  11 , Elaine C Lee  5 , Brendon P McDermott  12 , Kevin Miller  13 , Zachary Schlader  14 , Stacy Sims  15 , Rebecca L Stearns  3 , Chris Troyanos  16 , Jonathan Wingo  17
Affiliations
Review

Practical Hydration Solutions for Sports

Luke N Belval et al. Nutrients. .

Abstract

Personalized hydration strategies play a key role in optimizing the performance and safety of athletes during sporting activities. Clinicians should be aware of the many physiological, behavioral, logistical and psychological issues that determine both the athlete's fluid needs during sport and his/her opportunity to address them; these are often specific to the environment, the event and the individual athlete. In this paper we address the major considerations for assessing hydration status in athletes and practical solutions to overcome obstacles of a given sport. Based on these solutions, practitioners can better advise athletes to develop practices that optimize hydration for their sports.

Keywords: athletics; exercise; fluid replacement.

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Conflict of interest statement

Douglas Casa is the Chief Executive Officer of the Korey Stringer Institute, a 503.c not for profit which subsists on the donations from our corporate partners who include Gatorade, CamelBak, NFL, NATA, Mission, Eagle Pharmaceuticals and Kestrel. He has also been a recipient of grant funds from the following entities to study hydration related products: GE Healthcare, Halo Wearables, Nix Inc., CamelBak. William Adams has consulted with the following entities regarding hydration and exercise performance or the development of hydration assessment devices: BSX Athletics; Samsung Oak Holdings, Inc; Nobo, Inc; Clif Bar &Company; The Gatorade Company, Inc. Lawrence Armstrong is a hydration consultant to Danone Nutricia Research, France and the Drinking Water Research Foundation, Alexandria VA, USA. Lindsay Baker is employed by the Gatorade Sports Science Institute, a division of PepsiCo, Inc. The views expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the position or policy of PepsiCo, Inc. Louise Burke was a member of the Gatorade Sports Science Institute’s Expert Panel from 2014–2015 for which her workplace received an honorarium. Jose Gonzalez-Alonso was a member of the Gatorade Sports Science Institute’s Expert Panel in 2017 for which his workplace received an honorarium. Stavros Kavouras has served as scientific consultant for Quest Diagnostics, Standard Process and Danone Research and has active grants with Danone Research. The funders had no role in the in the writing of the manuscript.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Factors that contribute to the risk of hypohydration or hyperhydration during exercise.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Target fluid replacement estimates to prevent >2 ± 1 % body mass (BM) loss as water (i.e., dehydration). The 70 kg athlete in the example would need to drink a volume of fluid equal to 2.6 ± 0.7 L to prevent >2 ± 1% dehydration when losing 4 L of body water, such as during a marathon (42.1 km). During shorter distances such as 5 or 10 km when fluid losses are unlikely to reach or exceed 2% dehydration, the same athlete would not need to ingest fluids during competition as fluid losses accumulate to <2% dehydration.
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