I just got back from the ER- because of salt. I’m athlete and started training hard about 3 months ago. I always replace my sweat with water. Well after three months, I started getting dizzy spells and experiencing heart palpitations. The worst was yesterday; nearly passed out driving. A week ago I thought I had high blood pressure (false reading from a home machine) so I did the unthinkable. I completely cut out salt! Nothing like a trip to the ER to wake you up. The nurse said that my salt levels were dangerously low. After two IV bags and a bowl of salty soup, I’m on my way to recovery. Thank you for sharing this video.
Hi Michael- glad other you are on the road to recovery and I hope you get back on your feet soon. If you want to chat about your hydration strategy to see if we can help reduce your negative symptoms then please follow this link to book in a free 20 min video call with one of the team: www.precisionhydration.com/book-a-video-consultation/ Have a great day and rest up!
I am no pro nor will I ever race to get tested. But following your advice in various videos on youtube, for my last 137 km bike ride, I started carrying 6g salt in the bottles plus a saltier snacks. On top, plenty of different types of sugar (usually they just carry water). Result: felt fresh after the ride, not dead or faded as I usually feel. I even did a shorter ride the day after! which is usually a full rest day after a long ride. Now it's time to adjust the ratio. I think my biggest problem had been nutrition and would like to thank you for your informational videos and interviews. And especially your article "How to estimate how much sodium you lose in your sweat"!
This is great to hear Sonny! You can always book in a free 20 min video call with us to chat through any nutrition questions you have or if you need help adjusting any ratios- www.precisionhydration.com/book-a-video-consultation/ 🙂
How can I figure out how much salt i need per day? Is it possible just to trial and error? Starting with a half a teaspoon per day and just go by feeling? Lovely greetings from Germany
You don’t seem to consider the idea that there is not such a thing as a salty sweater. Your body gets rid of excess of sodium during exercise. If the balance is good or if you lack sodium, your sweat won’t be salty. If your sodium intake is too high, your sweat will be salty. What are your thoughts about that?
Hi David, thanks for the message. We're sold on the fact that individuals can lose vastly different amounts of sodium in their sweat and fall into different categories. Some people lose a little, some people lose a lot. The importance of sodium for athletes varies based on an individual's losses and event specifics, but even a 'low' salty sweater should consider dialling up their intake during long, hot, events when net losses could still be impactful. As for the effects of diet, so far research has suggested that sodium losses are less affected by external variables like diet but are largely genetically determined and linked to the sweat gland function.
@@precisionfandh Thanks for pointing that out. There are lots of theories out there, but unfortunately often contradicting. You seem to be really passionate about the topic and very knowledgeable. One final suggestion I had was the following: I can understand your concept of separating fluid intake from carb intake and support that. But why don’t you combine the carb intake with electrolyte intake? That is to say: develop a (hydro)gel that not only includes carbs, but also the electrolytes? I like to keep things simple during races and that would help.
@@davidosolo Thanks for coming back to us and you're right, there is a lot of conflicting advice out there. We do actually have a Drink Mix that combines carb and electrolytes which we developed alongside Lotto Dstny to address their specific needs, so never say never! But, in most cases, keeping carbs and electrolytes separate allows for a more flexible approach to pulling the carb, sodium and fluid 'levers' to optimise endurance performance. It's always tricky to have a proper discussion on TH-cam without being able to link out to research etc. But if you have any more questions or want to keep the conversation going you can always drop us an email (hello @ precision hydration . com).
Isn't the quantity of sodium present in the sweat in direct proportion to how much salt is consumed daily? Could you not turn a salty sweater to a low salt sweater by giving them a low salt diet over time?
Pretty much, yeah...what I commented above. On chemical level body doesn;t distinguish between Na and K!!! but all nerve firing and electrical communication and cellular transfer happens due to potassium (K). It's all about osmotic pressure. Our body doesn't count eletrolyte content. All electrolyte traffic through cell membrane, solely depends on osmotic pressure. More salty in the cell? ok...water is ingested into the cell and so on. Yes, that simple. K good, Na bad. I hope I am missing something because whole suplement industry pushing sugar water with table salt looks like a petty scam
Hi Martin, great question and it's one we receive regularly. Our experience of sweat testing a lot of athletes (in real-world conditions rather than in lab-based studies) does not completely tally with everything cited in the usual literature on sweat sodium concentrations. Although some early research led people to believe that 'less in, equalled less out' after strict dietary restrictions did show significant reductions in sweat Na concentrations. However, these findings aren't particularly applicable to the 'real-world' as it's almost impossible to totally restrict salt from your diet. In more recent years, Dr. Alan McCubbin has lead the research into whether there truly is an effect of sweat Na concentration due to dietary changes. In 2018, he and colleague Ricardo Costa published a systematic review (paper link: article.sapub.org/10.5923.j.sports.20180803.05.html) which sought to determine the impact of dietary sodium intake on sweat sodium concentration in response to endurance exercise. This was a great review of the literature and ultimately, Dr. McCubbin and Costa found no relationship between the change in sodium intake and the change in sweat sodium concentration. In our own experiences, we've found sweat sodium levels to be remarkably consistent within athletes when we perform repeat tests on them in different situations. We do often see some small (~5-10% shifts) in sweat Na concentration when testing athletes year on year or month on month but I've yet to see a really big change in sweat sodium in an individual even after extended periods of heat training and acclimation. I think one of, if not the, main reason that we don't see much variation in sweat Na concentrations is due to the biggest single determinant of sweat sodium concentration in an individual seems to be CFTR function (CFTR channels at the sweat gland are where sodium and chloride are reabsorbed before sweat leaves the gland) and the attached paper (and word doc explanation) by Mary Beth Brown describes that pretty well and helps explain why we see very high sweat sodium levels in some individuals (ie because of CFTR abundance and function). CFTR function is basically down to genetics and therefore the lions share of any sweat sodium variation we see between people is probably genetic. (When we test siblings and/or twins we very often see almost identical sweat sodium losses between them which also lends credence to this idea). Additionally and even allowing for the fact that sweat sodium may vary a few % between athletes in real-world conditions it is not something that would impact the type of re-hydration strategy they'd need to employ. As you know, we basically group athletes in to Low / Moderate / High or Very High groups for sweat sodium losses and along with information on sweat rate and duration of exercise this is basically what drives practical recommendations for what to drink/supplement with. As an example, if a low athlete (at ~600mg/l for example) dropped by 10% to 540mg/l, or even a little bit more that would not make a meaningful difference to the kind of sodium supplementation they'd need to take in during events and training. On the other hand a high athlete up at ~1800mg/l, even if they dropped to 1450mg/l (a 20% drop) would also not really change their plan a lot as a result. I do hope this helps but feel free to drop us an email at hello@precisionhydration.com if you have any more questions or would like to chat further. Cheers!
Sorry Martin, and if you want to read more about this particular subject, Sports Scientist Abby Coleman has written this blog: www.precisionhydration.com/performance-advice/hydration/relationship-sodium-intake-sweat-concentration/ Again, do let us know if you have any more questions. Thanks!
Hi Victor, Thanks for your question! If you are talking about taking on too much sodium and the consequences of this we have a great article which can be found doing the following: PF&H website -> knowledge hub -> can you overdose on sports drink? If you have any further questions please reach out to us on email!
That's a great observation Ben and one of the issues with sports hydration is the smoke and mirrors around the sodium content. In this example, Salt and Natriumchloride are both sodium chloride, the compound. Sodium, the element, makes up ~39% of the composition of sodium chloride - and is what we're most concerned with when talking about sweating. So, if a product says it contains 1g/1000mg of Salt, in reality, it contains ~390mg of sodium. Does that make sense? Don't hesitate to send any follow-up questions over.
Bro you just need to know the formula for Salt (NaCl) and its molar mass which is 58.5u. The molar mass of Na (sodium) is 23u. Then, divide the molar mass of sodium by that of salt: 23/58.5 =~0.393162... or about 39% So you can have 39% sodium in any weight of salt. For 0,950 gr of Salt, 39%*0,950 = 0,373 gr ou 373mg of Sodium. Wish you a great day! :D
I keep bicarbonate of soda in the house. Half a teaspoon in a mug of water. Great for killing germs in your throat or rinsing your mouth when ill and also great for a recharge when low on sodium. (It is sodium bicarbonate). Also good for settling an overly acidic stomach, makes you burp.
That's a great question Lummi and the answer really comes down to timing. If you're working hard and looking to optimise performance then sugar/carbohydrates are necessary and beneficial. If you want to dive more into this topic head to our website and search 'the S word' in the blog section.
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I just got back from the ER- because of salt. I’m athlete and started training hard about 3 months ago. I always replace my sweat with water. Well after three months, I started getting dizzy spells and experiencing heart palpitations. The worst was yesterday; nearly passed out driving. A week ago I thought I had high blood pressure (false reading from a home machine) so I did the unthinkable. I completely cut out salt! Nothing like a trip to the ER to wake you up. The nurse said that my salt levels were dangerously low.
After two IV bags and a bowl of salty soup, I’m on my way to recovery.
Thank you for sharing this video.
Hi Michael- glad other you are on the road to recovery and I hope you get back on your feet soon. If you want to chat about your hydration strategy to see if we can help reduce your negative symptoms then please follow this link to book in a free 20 min video call with one of the team: www.precisionhydration.com/book-a-video-consultation/
Have a great day and rest up!
I am no pro nor will I ever race to get tested. But following your advice in various videos on youtube, for my last 137 km bike ride, I started carrying 6g salt in the bottles plus a saltier snacks. On top, plenty of different types of sugar (usually they just carry water). Result: felt fresh after the ride, not dead or faded as I usually feel. I even did a shorter ride the day after! which is usually a full rest day after a long ride. Now it's time to adjust the ratio.
I think my biggest problem had been nutrition and would like to thank you for your informational videos and interviews. And especially your article "How to estimate how much sodium you lose in your sweat"!
This is great to hear Sonny! You can always book in a free 20 min video call with us to chat through any nutrition questions you have or if you need help adjusting any ratios- www.precisionhydration.com/book-a-video-consultation/
🙂
Good one thanks!
How can I figure out how much salt i need per day?
Is it possible just to trial and error? Starting with a half a teaspoon per day and just go by feeling?
Lovely greetings from Germany
You don’t seem to consider the idea that there is not such a thing as a salty sweater. Your body gets rid of excess of sodium during exercise. If the balance is good or if you lack sodium, your sweat won’t be salty. If your sodium intake is too high, your sweat will be salty. What are your thoughts about that?
Hi David, thanks for the message.
We're sold on the fact that individuals can lose vastly different amounts of sodium in their sweat and fall into different categories. Some people lose a little, some people lose a lot.
The importance of sodium for athletes varies based on an individual's losses and event specifics, but even a 'low' salty sweater should consider dialling up their intake during long, hot, events when net losses could still be impactful.
As for the effects of diet, so far research has suggested that sodium losses are less affected by external variables like diet but are largely genetically determined and linked to the sweat gland function.
@@precisionfandh Thanks for pointing that out. There are lots of theories out there, but unfortunately often contradicting. You seem to be really passionate about the topic and very knowledgeable.
One final suggestion I had was the following:
I can understand your concept of separating fluid intake from carb intake and support that. But why don’t you combine the carb intake with electrolyte intake? That is to say: develop a (hydro)gel that not only includes carbs, but also the electrolytes? I like to keep things simple during races and that would help.
@@davidosolo Thanks for coming back to us and you're right, there is a lot of conflicting advice out there.
We do actually have a Drink Mix that combines carb and electrolytes which we developed alongside Lotto Dstny to address their specific needs, so never say never! But, in most cases, keeping carbs and electrolytes separate allows for a more flexible approach to pulling the carb, sodium and fluid 'levers' to optimise endurance performance. It's always tricky to have a proper discussion on TH-cam without being able to link out to research etc. But if you have any more questions or want to keep the conversation going you can always drop us an email (hello @ precision hydration . com).
Isn't the quantity of sodium present in the sweat in direct proportion to how much salt is consumed daily? Could you not turn a salty sweater to a low salt sweater by giving them a low salt diet over time?
Pretty much, yeah...what I commented above. On chemical level body doesn;t distinguish between Na and K!!! but all nerve firing and electrical communication and cellular transfer happens due to potassium (K). It's all about osmotic pressure. Our body doesn't count eletrolyte content. All electrolyte traffic through cell membrane, solely depends on osmotic pressure. More salty in the cell? ok...water is ingested into the cell and so on. Yes, that simple. K good, Na bad. I hope I am missing something because whole suplement industry pushing sugar water with table salt looks like a petty scam
Hi Martin, great question and it's one we receive regularly.
Our experience of sweat testing a lot of athletes (in real-world conditions rather than in lab-based studies) does not completely tally with everything cited in the usual literature on sweat sodium concentrations.
Although some early research led people to believe that 'less in, equalled less out' after strict dietary restrictions did show significant reductions in sweat Na concentrations.
However, these findings aren't particularly applicable to the 'real-world' as it's almost impossible to totally restrict salt from your diet.
In more recent years, Dr. Alan McCubbin has lead the research into whether there truly is an effect of sweat Na concentration due to dietary changes. In 2018, he and colleague Ricardo Costa published a systematic review (paper link: article.sapub.org/10.5923.j.sports.20180803.05.html) which sought to determine the impact of dietary sodium intake on sweat sodium concentration in response to endurance exercise.
This was a great review of the literature and ultimately, Dr. McCubbin and Costa found no relationship between the change in sodium intake and the change in sweat sodium concentration.
In our own experiences, we've found sweat sodium levels to be remarkably consistent within athletes when we perform repeat tests on them in different situations. We do often see some small (~5-10% shifts) in sweat Na concentration when testing athletes year on year or month on month but I've yet to see a really big change in sweat sodium in an individual even after extended periods of heat training and acclimation.
I think one of, if not the, main reason that we don't see much variation in sweat Na concentrations is due to the biggest single determinant of sweat sodium concentration in an individual seems to be CFTR function (CFTR channels at the sweat gland are where sodium and chloride are reabsorbed before sweat leaves the gland) and the attached paper (and word doc explanation) by Mary Beth Brown describes that pretty well and helps explain why we see very high sweat sodium levels in some individuals (ie because of CFTR abundance and function). CFTR function is basically down to genetics and therefore the lions share of any sweat sodium variation we see between people is probably genetic. (When we test siblings and/or twins we very often see almost identical sweat sodium losses between them which also lends credence to this idea).
Additionally and even allowing for the fact that sweat sodium may vary a few % between athletes in real-world conditions it is not something that would impact the type of re-hydration strategy they'd need to employ. As you know, we basically group athletes in to Low / Moderate / High or Very High groups for sweat sodium losses and along with information on sweat rate and duration of exercise this is basically what drives practical recommendations for what to drink/supplement with.
As an example, if a low athlete (at ~600mg/l for example) dropped by 10% to 540mg/l, or even a little bit more that would not make a meaningful difference to the kind of sodium supplementation they'd need to take in during events and training. On the other hand a high athlete up at ~1800mg/l, even if they dropped to 1450mg/l (a 20% drop) would also not really change their plan a lot as a result.
I do hope this helps but feel free to drop us an email at hello@precisionhydration.com if you have any more questions or would like to chat further.
Cheers!
Sorry Martin, and if you want to read more about this particular subject, Sports Scientist Abby Coleman has written this blog:
www.precisionhydration.com/performance-advice/hydration/relationship-sodium-intake-sweat-concentration/
Again, do let us know if you have any more questions.
Thanks!
What are the consequences during a race if the sodium intake is too important?
Hi Victor,
Thanks for your question! If you are talking about taking on too much sodium and the consequences of this we have a great article which can be found doing the following: PF&H website -> knowledge hub -> can you overdose on sports drink?
If you have any further questions please reach out to us on email!
When I looked at another brands electrolyte tablets, they state on a lable of content:
Salt: 0,95grm
Natriumchloride: 0,375grm
Where is the sodium??
That's a great observation Ben and one of the issues with sports hydration is the smoke and mirrors around the sodium content.
In this example, Salt and Natriumchloride are both sodium chloride, the compound. Sodium, the element, makes up ~39% of the composition of sodium chloride - and is what we're most concerned with when talking about sweating.
So, if a product says it contains 1g/1000mg of Salt, in reality, it contains ~390mg of sodium.
Does that make sense?
Don't hesitate to send any follow-up questions over.
Bro you just need to know the formula for Salt (NaCl) and its molar mass which is 58.5u.
The molar mass of Na (sodium) is 23u.
Then, divide the molar mass of sodium by that of salt: 23/58.5 =~0.393162... or about 39%
So you can have 39% sodium in any weight of salt.
For 0,950 gr of Salt, 39%*0,950 = 0,373 gr ou 373mg of Sodium.
Wish you a great day! :D
I keep bicarbonate of soda in the house. Half a teaspoon in a mug of water. Great for killing germs in your throat or rinsing your mouth when ill and also great for a recharge when low on sodium. (It is sodium bicarbonate). Also good for settling an overly acidic stomach, makes you burp.
is sugar good for athletes ?
That's a great question Lummi and the answer really comes down to timing. If you're working hard and looking to optimise performance then sugar/carbohydrates are necessary and beneficial. If you want to dive more into this topic head to our website and search 'the S word' in the blog section.
I'd say only after workout in my personal experience