Staying hydrated is one of the most essential aspects of sport and physical activity, whether you are an athlete or someone who plays sports to get fit. in shape. It plays so many roles in keeping your body functioning properly that without an adequate amount of water, your body simply cannot perform at its peak. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why violent video games should not be banned”? Get an original essay If you exercise on dry land, for example by playing ball sports, cycling or running working out at the gym, you're hot and sweaty so it's pretty obvious to stop for a drink. However, when exercising in water, it's not as obvious. The usual signs that you need to hydrate are much harder to notice. Your body doesn't feel like it's sweating, the water helps keep you cool, and you don't often get a dry mouth while swimming. This often makes you feel like you don't need to rehydrate. As a swimmer, it's important to self-monitor your hydration by drinking plenty of water before and after, as well as during your workout. Water makes up about 60% of your body's overall mass, so as you might imagine, it participates in just about everything you do. It helps regulate your body temperature; it lubricates your joints, moves nutrients through your body, helps eliminate waste, aids digestion – the list goes on. So if you haven't drunk enough water before, or during and after training, your performance will suffer. Perhaps the most obvious is the fact that the less water you have in the body, the higher the temperature, therefore the more dehydrated you are. will become. This becomes a vicious cycle of dehydration. It also increases your heart rate, making the overall act of swimming much more difficult than it usually would be. Even if you think you've had a hell of a workout because you're tired and fatigued, in reality, it's very possible that your perception is simply skewed. This is not only detrimental to your physical improvement, it can also have a negative mental effect. If you've been doing the same workout twice a week, but the second time you weren't able to complete it because you were dehydrated, this can often make you feel like you're not progressing the way you should. Dehydration of just 2% can have a noticeable effect on performance. But it's not just your performance on the day that can suffer. An important part of any workout is the recovery process and dehydration also has a negative effect on this. First, water is used to aid digestion. The enzymes that break down food and dissolve minerals are found in your saliva, which is made up of water, and water is used to break down soluble fiber. Enzymes don't work as well as they should when they reach the stomach if the acidic solution (stomach acid) is thicker due to dehydration. This reduces the efficiency of the digestive process and this will in turn slow down the recovery process. Muscles are 75% water and you need it to help digest the nutrients needed to repair and rebuild muscles that have been broken down. damaged during exercise. In a state of dehydration, the synthesis of proteins used to rebuild muscles is much slower, again delaying your recovery after your.