How much water must you drink?

TAP WATER: SAFE, BUT REMAINS FAR BEHIND OTHER VERSIONS COMPOSITION-WISE

Iam sure you have heard, a million times, that you need to drink more water, but what happens when you take on the challenge to hydrate more often, as an athlete. For every one hour of vigorous training you need to drink an additional 500ml of water. This will ensure that you are well hydrated throughout your day, your training and your recovery. You are now on a quest to get the right amount of water into your body, but, do you opt for tap water or for mineral or purified water?

I headed off to H20 International in Bedfordview to ask some questions. Leejay Carrozzo, owner and water purifing specialist says though tap water is safe to drink it is not pure. Tap water can contain small amounts of arsenic, aluminium, high amounts of chlorine, E-coli, cadium, hydrogen sulphide, lead and mercury to name a few.

Short-term it might not have any effect but when you read a published article that aluminium is linked to breast cancer and Alzheimer‘s, one has to stop and think: Are you really going to risk that chance? Athletes would be drinking two to three times more water than the average person, and could this potentially put athletes more at risk?

Purified water follows a process of installing a filtration system on your tap or underneath your counter. Tap water passes through a media bed comprising granular activated carbon, KDF and Riolyte which essentially cleans, polishes and purifies the water.

This is why purified water has similar elements to that of natural mineral water from the earth.

Even natural mineral water goes through an industrial filter before consumption.

Carrozzo placed two cups on the table, one tap water and one purified water. He placed chlorine test drops in one tap water and a few drops in the purified water. Chlorine test drops can be found in your standard pool testing kit. It measures how much chlorine is in your pool by changing to yellow.

Astonishingly the tap water turned bright yellow which means there are large amounts of chlorine in the water whereas the purified water remained the same. If you had to take a cauliflower leaf and place it into the yellow, chlorine stained water cup, it will absorb all the chlorine which means even if you are cooking with tap water, you will still be ingesting it.

Filters aim to give you a higher quality water by improving the taste, odour and colour, while keeping your water safe from bacteria, disinfectants and heavy metals.

Mineral or purified water is probably the safer route to go for athletes, since it contains minerals such as calcium, iron, magnesium, potassium and a low PH which are key ingredients for athletes. When you train, you sweat and lose essential minerals and vitamins, and by drinking a higher quality water, you are able to replace some of what you lost.

I am firmly of the school of thought that it is not one great thing that is going to make the biggest difference but rather the sum of all the little things you do correctly. This is definitely one important element to add to your repertoire.

I am sure you have heard, a million times, that you need to drink more water, but what happens when you take on the challenge to hydrate more often, as an athlete. If you have forgotten the formula for how much water you are supposed to have then here it is: