Motion Health & Fitness

Tag: hydration

  • Why Your Weight May Be Fluctuating So Much

    Why Your Weight May Be Fluctuating So Much

    Many people veer from happy to unhappy to utterly confused watching their weight go up and down each day. It’s not uncommon for our bodyweight to fluctuate from 1 to 5 pounds overnight.

    The main culprit is water retention and there’s a multitude of things that can cause this. One pound equals just 15.34 fluid ounces of water or 450 ml. So, if you have just 1 liter of extra water in your system, that’s more than two pounds of extra weight.

    Carbohydrates encourage your body to retain water, so the more carbs you eat, the more water you retain.

    One gram of carbs tends to store 3-4 grams of water — so if you’re consuming more carbs in one meal than you can efficiently use, they’ll end up getting stored as glycogen and make you hold onto more water.

    For example, eating 50 grams of carbohydrate will result in the storage of an additional 150-200 grams of water in the liver and muscles. That’s a total of 200-250 grams between the carbohydrate and water, which is half-pound (1 pound = 454 grams).

    This water retention occurs because your kidneys retain sodium in response to carbohydrate consumption. Your body reacts to the higher sodium levels by storing more water to keep the sodium-blood concentration at a healthy level.

    When you eat too much salt, the cells of your body must compensate by absorbing more water to balance out sodium concentrations.

    Consuming 400 milligrams of sodium, the amount in a single gram of table salt, causes your body to retain an extra 4 cups of water, which equals roughly 2 pounds.

    Eating fast food and processed food, which are high in sodium, can cause weight fluctuations of 2 pounds or more.

    The best way to reduce water retention is to reduce your salt intake. According to the 2015-2020 Dietary Guidelines published by the US Government, adults should limit their sodium intake to 2300 mg (1 teaspoon) or less. However, on average, Americans eat more than 3,400 milligrams of sodium each day.

    The second most important way to reduce water retention is to drink more water. This may seem counterintuitive, but it’s the solution. Drinking more water causes the excess salt to diffuse out of your cells, and it can then be flushed from the body by your kidneys and skin.

    Ironically, skimping on your H2O results in water retention. If you’re not drinking enough water, your body holds onto every last drop inside to prevent severe dehydration. Dehydration causes your body to hoard water, which in turn causes bloating.

    The National Academy of Medicine (NAM) recommends a total daily water intake of 120 ounces (15 cups) for the average adult male and 88 ounces (11 cups) for the average adult female.

    Intense exercise also helps to quickly flush excess sodium out of the body.

    In summary: cut your salt intake, drink more water each day and exercise intensely most days of the week.

    Get in Motion. Stay in Motion.

     

  • Six Reasons Why Water is So Critical to Your Health

    Six Reasons Why Water is So Critical to Your Health

    Water is the single most critical nutrient to your body. Therefore, drinking sufficient water is essential to your health and, because it is excreted by the body in various ways all day long, it’s important to replace it throughout the day. When your water intake does not equal your output, you become dehydrated.

    Fluid losses occur continuously — from skin evaporation, breathing, urine and stool — and these losses must be replaced daily to maintain good health. Even mild dehydration can cause daytime fatigue.

    I’ve long been a proponent of drinking a tall glass of water upon waking each morning, before breakfast or even coffee. Caffeine is a diuretic, meaning it increases your urine output. For roughly every 100 milligrams of caffeine you consume – the approximate amount in one cup of coffee or two cups of black tea – you should drink an additional cup of water to compensate for the drug’s diuretic effect (yes, caffeine is a drug).

    Your body also excretes water while you sleep, through perspiration and breathing. So even if you’re not a coffee drinker, this lost water should be replaced immediately each morning.

    Fluid losses are heightened during strenuous exercise, in warmer climates, at high altitudes and in older adults, whose sense of thirst may not be as discerning.

    Here are six prime reasons to make sure you’re drinking enough water every day:

    1. Drinking Water Helps Maintain Every System in Your Body

    Your body is composed of about 60% water. The lungs are about 83% water; the muscles and kidneys are 79% water; the brain and heart are composed of 73% water; and even the bones are 31% water.

    Your body fluids are critical to digestion, absorption, circulation, transportation of nutrients, creation of saliva and maintenance of body temperature.

    Body fluids transport waste products in and out of cells. The main toxin in the body is blood-urea nitrogen, a water-soluble waste that is able to pass through the kidneys to be excreted in the urine.

    When you’re getting enough fluids, urine flows freely, is light in color and free of odor. When your body is not getting enough fluids, urine concentration, color and odor increase because the kidneys trap extra fluid for bodily functions.

    2. Water Can Aid Weight Loss

    Water is a great appetite suppressant because it makes you feel fuller. Drinking a glass of water before meals can curb your appetite, helping you eat less without feeling hungry. Since water is 100% calorie-free, substituting it for higher-calorie beverages can help with weight loss.

    Water also helps you burn more calories. The amount of calories burned by the body at rest is known as resting energy expenditure. In adults, resting energy expenditure has been shown to increase by 24–30% within 10 minutes of drinking water. This lasts at least 60 minutes. The effects are heightened by cold water. When you drink cold water, your body uses extra calories to warm up the water to body temperature.

    Two separate studies showed that increasing water intake to over 1 liter (34 oz) per day resulted in an extra 4.4 pounds of weight loss over a 12-month period. That’s roughly 17,000 additional calories burned annually.

    Water also increases the body’s ability to metabolize stored fat. Inadequate water intake can cause fat deposits to increase, while sufficient water intake can actually reduce fat deposits.

    3. Water Helps Build Muscles

    Muscle cells need to maintain a balance of fluids and electrolytes to avoid fatigue, weakness and shrinking. In short, inadequate fluid intake can cause performance to suffer. Again, your muscles are 79% water.

    Research has shown that when cells lose water, protein production can slow down and protein breakdown can speed up. This could hamper post-exercise muscle protein synthesis. Greater muscle breakdown results in less new-muscle growth.

    Aerobic performance, such as running or cycling, can decrease when body weight drops just 2-3% as a result of dehydration. Power generation can also become compromised with the loss of just 3% in body weight.

    Researchers determined that when test subjects were dehydrated by 3%, total repetitions performed were significantly lower. The subjects also perceived the exercises as more difficult and they needed longer for their heart rates to recover.

    4. Water is Critical to a Healthy Digestive Process

    Adequate water helps to maintain a normal digestive tract. It helps to properly metabolize food and transport nutrients.

    Water also helps to maintain normal bowel function; adequate hydration can prevent constipation.

    5. Water is Vital to Healthy, Good-Looking Skin

    Your skin contains 64% water. Dehydration makes your skin look dry and wrinkled. Proper hydration may help prevent wrinkles and may even decrease some. Being well hydrated can also help rid the skin and body of toxins.

    Healthy, well-hydrated skin also easily absorbs water from moisturizers and creams, increasing the benefit of skincare products.

    6. Sufficient Water Intake is Important for Your Heart

    Your heart pumps about 2,000 gallons of blood a day and it is able to pump blood more easily when well-hydrated, allowing it to work more easily and efficiently. Water also helps maintain blood pressure. Dehydration can cause blood to become thicker, increasing blood pressure.

    Dehydration causes strain on your heart because your blood volume decreases when you are dehydrated. This results in your heart beating faster and working harder. Water delivers oxygen throughout the body. Blood, which is more than 90 percent water, carries oxygen to all parts of the body.

    How Much Water Should You Drink?

    The National Academy of Medicine (NAM) recommends a total daily water intake of 3.7 liters (15 cups) for the average adult male and 2.7 liters (11 cups) for the average adult female.

    Water needs vary tremendously, according to the individual, and are dependent on factors such as temperature, altitude and activity level. If you’re exercising, you need more water than when you’re sedentary. People who exercise regularly may need more daily water intake than those who are not very active.

    The American College of Sports Medicine’s guidelines recommend that people drink about 17 ounces of fluid roughly two hours before exercise. During exercise, they recommend that people start drinking fluids early, and drink them at regular intervals to replace fluids lost by sweating.

    Eating more fruits and vegetables can aid hydration due to their high water content. About 20% of our fluid intake comes from foods. Having a beverage with every snack and meal will increase hydration.

    Drink plenty of water. Eat healthy. Sleep plentifully. Stay healthy.

     

  • Proper Hydration Vital to Good Health and Exercise

    Proper Hydration Vital to Good Health and Exercise

    Water is your body’s principal chemical component and constitutes about 60 percent of your body weight. Every system in your body depends on water. Lack of water can lead to dehydration, which prevents your body from carrying out normal functions. Even mild dehydration can drain your energy, create fatigue and even cause headaches and nausea.

    Your ability to perform exercise can decline with a very small amount of dehydration. Losing just 2% of your body weight in fluid can decrease performance by up to 25%.
     
    Adults produce an average of about 1 – 2 liters of urine per day, depending on their state of hydration, activity level, environmental factors, weight and the individual’s health. But we lose water in more ways than one.
     
    In addition to urine, we are constantly losing water through sweat and even breathing. Since the body excretes water to maintain body temperature, we lose even more when we exercise.
     
    Sweating is a primary means of thermoregulation, since the evaporation of sweat from the skin has a cooling effect. Hence, in hot weather, or when your muscles heat up due to exertion/exercise, more sweat is produced. All of that water must be replaced.
     
    The volume of water lost in sweat daily is highly variable, ranging from 100 milliliters to 8 liters per day. Maximum sweat rates of an adult can be up to 2-4 liters per hour or 10-14 liters per day. However, during average intensity exercise, sweat loss can average up to 2 liters of water per hour.
     
    So how much water do you need to consume to offset these losses?
     
    The Institute of Medicine says adult men actually need about 13 cups (3 liters) of fluid per day, while adult women need about 9 cups (2.2 liters) of fluid (you get about an additional 2 1/2 cups of fluid from foods). The bigger you are, the more water you need. And if you exercise, you need even more water.
     
    In the summertime, or if you live in a warm climate, you’ll also need to drink more water than the recommended amount. That’s because heat can make you sweat more and lose fluids faster.
     
    Monitor your urine color will tell you how hydrated you are. Lighter urine color means you’re generally well-hydrated. If it’s darker, you are most likely dehydrated.
     
    Older adults are more likely to become dehydrated because their sense of thirst declines. Pregnant women and nursing mothers need slightly more water. Additionally, some medications, such as antihistamines and certain antidepressants, increase your fluid needs too.
     
    Alcohol, particularly at high doses, can cause you to excrete more than you consume. One drink, especially of beer, won’t do much (it’s about 92 percent water), but wine and hard liquor have more of a dehydrating effect because of their higher alcohol content.
     
    It’s not only important to drink water during your workout, but also before your workout. You must pre-hydrate to prepare for exercise. The reality is that it’s important to drink water before, during and after your workout. If you start out dehydrated, you won’t have a good workout. You’ll feel lethargic and perhaps even dizzy. Your body simply won’t function well.
     
    If you are well hydrated, you’ll feel stronger and will be able to work out longer and more effectively. That’s because the heart doesn’t have to work as hard to pump blood through the body.
     
    So, how much water do you need before and during exercise? Follow this formula:
     
    • One to two hours before your workout, drink 16 to 20 ounces of water
     
    • 15 minutes before you begin, drink between 8 and 10 ounces of water
     
    • During your workout, drink another 8 ounces every 15 minutes.
     
    If you hydrate accordingly, you’ll get so much more from your exercise, and you’ll be safer too.
  • For Exercisers, Prepare & Repair

    For Exercisers, Prepare & Repair

    Diet and nutrition are the critical counterpoints to a regular exercise program. Both proteins and carbohydrates are essential for preparing for your workouts, as well as for recovering from them.
     
    To feed the rigorous demands of working out, you need to prepare your body for exercise and then repair it from the associated stresses. Proteins and carbs provide both the fuel that drives you during your workouts, as well as the building blocks that help you recover.
     
    If you don’t eat before exercise, you won’t have adequate fuel to get you through an intense workout. Instead, you’ll feel tired and weak and have limited endurance. That’s because complex carbs provide the energy that fuels muscle contractions.
     
    Carbohydrates are broken down by the body into glucose, which is used as energy. Any glucose not immediately used is stored in the muscles and the liver, in the form of glycogen.
     
    Glycogen is the source of energy most often used for exercise. Because it is immediately accessible, glycogen is used for any short, intense bouts of exercise, from sprinting to weight lifting. Glycogen also supplies energy during the first few minutes of any sport. Though fat helps to fuel activity during long, slow-duration exercise, glycogen is still needed to help break down the fat into something the muscles can use.
     
    Adequate carbohydrate intake also helps prevent protein from being used as energy. If the body doesn’t have enough carbohydrate, protein is broken down to make glucose for energy. That’s undesirable because proteins are the building blocks for muscles, bones and other vital tissues.
     
    Though carbohydrates are the human body’s key source of energy, not all carbs are created equally. Simple carbohydrates, or sugars, can cause a spike in blood sugar, thereby stimulating excess insulin production, which causes a fast drop in blood sugar. This creates a vicious cycle of hunger and eating, followed by more hunger and more eating. Stick with complex carbohydrates of the fibrous variety, such as legumes, brown rice, whole oats, and vegetables. These are digested slowly and do not cause a spike in blood sugar (glucose).
     
    Depending on your ability to break down food, you need at least an hour, perhaps 90 minutes, to properly digest before commencing exercise. You only need a small amount of food (about 200 calories), primarily consisting of carbohydrates. Small portions of food are easily broken down and digested, providing more immediate energy.
     
    However, carbohydrates are also vital in the post-workout period. Eating carbs in your post-training meal will kick-start the muscle-building process. If you lack carbohydrates, you’ll fail to support the growth process. That’s because muscle glycogen not only provides fuel for hard training, but it also supports recovery.
     
    Carbohydrates directly support muscle-building by fueling muscles and helping them to remain anabolic. Energy-starved muscles quickly fall out of an anabolic state and fail to grow. Carbs also create a special hormonal environment that plays a critical role in growth — they initiate the release of insulin, which increases protein uptake by muscles. Insulin also helps muscles take in testosterone, the body’s chief muscle-building hormone.
     
    Carbohydrates aren’t just the most important nutrient for exercising muscles; they are essential for brain and CNS function.
     
    Consume at least 50 grams of carbohydrates (in addition to protein) in the meal following your workout to kick-start the rebuilding process. If you don’t gain body fat from eating that much, boost it to 70-80 grams.
     
    Also, be sure to eat an adequate portion of protein in your post-training meal; anywhere from 70-100 grams should be sufficient for muscle repair.and growth.
     
    Protein ingestion also helps athletes recover from exercise. After all, proteins are the building blocks of muscle tissue. They aid in the repair of exercise-induced damage to muscle fibers. Unless a protein-containing meal is consumed during the recovery period, muscle breakdown will exceed muscle synthesis, resulting in the loss of muscle mass.
     
    Some proteins digest faster than others. Whey protein, egg whites and some fish rapidly reach the bloodstream, while casein protein, red meat, poultry and whole eggs are slower. Faster-digesting proteins are best in the morning to reverse the overnight fast when the body sometimes falls out of a growth state. They’re also best before and after training, when the body needs immediate sources of protein to help prevent muscle breakdown. At other times of day, slower-digesting proteins do just fine.
     
    Proteins and carbohydrates are best eaten together because they work synergistically, upgrading the ability to drive amino acids into muscles and resulting in growth.
     
    Adults should get 45 percent to 65 percent of their calories from carbohydrates, 20 percent to 35 percent from fat, and 10 to 35 percent from protein, according to the National Academy of Science.
     
    A triathlete, marathoner of other endurance athlete might get 60 percent of their daily calories from carbohydrates and 20 percent each from fats and proteins. But a dedicated weight trainer or body builder may lower the percentage of carbs and increase the percentage of protein, finding a balance more along the lines of 50 percent carbohydrates, 20 percent fat and 30 protein.
     
    Some people might have a hard time breaking their daily macronutrient intake into percentages. For these people, keeping track of their total protein ingestion might be easier.
     
    The Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA) for protein for persons over 18 years of age, irrespective of physical activity status, is 0.8 gram per kilogram of body weight per day (1 kilogram equals 2.2 pounds).
     
    However, many sports nutrition experts (American College of Sports Medicine, American Dietetic Association) have concluded that protein requirements are higher for athletes.
     
    The protein recommendations for endurance athletes are 1.2 to 1.4 grams per kilogram of body weight per day, whereas those for resistance and strength-trained athletes may be as high as 1.6 to 1.7 grams per kilogram of body weight per day.
     
    Remember, you’ll get the most out of your training if you prepare for and repair from your workouts. Pushing your body hard to improve health and fitness requires you to nourish it. By giving your body everything it needs, you’ll get the most out of it.