Don't Remember the Titans

I'm sure the majority of you have seen the film Remember the Titans.  It's a very inspirational story about a football team, but I couldn't disagree more with one of the quotes from the movie.  At one point when a player begs his coach for a water break during practice, part of the coach's response was: "Water makes you weak."  I understand that they were looking to develop discipline and mental toughness in their players, but his belief couldn't be further from the truth.  We all know that our bodies are about 70% water, but our muscles are about 90% water, which means that dehydration leads to strength loss.  Wrestling legend Gene Mills said it best in an interview when he explained that drinking insufficient amounts of water "turns some of the toughest guys into wusses."

When wrestlers dehydrate to cut weight, they think that they can quickly rehydrate by simply drinking a ton of liquids after weigh-ins.  However, it takes your body at least as long to rehydrate as it did to dehydrate.  That said, if you were cutting back on fluids for a full 24 hours, your muscle cells certainly won't be fully replenished in the hour between weigh-ins and your match.  I'll discuss losing weight more as the season draws nearer, but ideally you want to drink about a gallon of water per day, not including the fluids you replace after practice.  This one gallon recommendation could be more or less depending on how much you weigh.

But guess what.  Coffee, juice, pop, milk, or anything else don't count towards that gallon of water per day.  During my freshman year of high school our cross country coach told us that you need water to help you digest nutrients, even if those nutrients are in liquid form.  He said that if we had an 8 oz. gatorade, we should have 8 oz. of water with it.  The same goes for other beverages; if you're drinking anything besides water, have an equal amount of water with it.

Drink up,
Jeff