Proper hydration is extremely important during exercise. Adequate fluid intake for athletes, even the recreational kind, is essential to comfort, performance and safety. The longer and more intensely you exercise, the more important it is to drink plenty of fluids. Inadequate water consumption can be physically harmful.

Consider that a loss of as little as 2% of one’s body weight due to sweating, can lead to a drop in blood volume. When this occurs, the heart works harder in order to move blood through the bloodstream. Prehydration and rehydration are vital to maintaining cardiovascular health, proper body temperature and muscle function.

The natural choice for hydration is water. It hydrates better than any other liquid, both before and during exercise. Water tends to be less expensive and more available than any other drink. You need to drink 4-6 ounces of water for every 15-20 minutes of exercise. That can add up to a lot of water!

While some people prefer the taste of water over other drinks, most people find it relatively bland and will stop drinking water before becoming fully hydrated. Water is the best, but it only helps you if you drink it. One of the reasons that sports drinks are so popular is the fact that they taste good. Many manufacturers only add sugar, flavor and color to attract the consumer, even though the drink contains no electrolytes and is simply flavored water.

The key to good hydration is drinking a lot of water before, during and after any workout or activity. Water is essential for proper bodily function. Sports drinks aren’t the only way to consume electrolytes. Eating a normal diet will provide the body with more than enough electrolytes needed for exercising and physical activity.

Energy drinks can be helpful to athletes who are exercising at a high intensity for 90 minutes or more. Fluids supplying 60 to 100 calories per 8 ounces helps to supply the needed calories required for continuous performance. It’s really not necessary to replace losses of sodium, potassium and other electrolytes during exercise since you’re unlikely to deplete your body’s stores of these minerals during normal training. If, however, you find yourself exercising in extreme conditions over 5 or 6 hours (an Ironman or ultramarathon, for example) you will need to add a complex energy drink with electrolytes.

Does the average consumer derive any real benefit from the sports drinks? It’s a marketing gimmick, pure and simple. Most health experts agree that sports drinks have electrolytes and sodium that are beneficial to professional athletes and marathoners, but have little value to the average user. There’s a certain appeal in drinking what Olympic athletes drink, but it should be just water if you’re doing 10 minutes on a treadmill. And because many enhanced waters contain only small amounts of essential nutrients, consumers should look elsewhere for nutrition. That’s what we have food for!

BestXooma.com invites you to watch Xtreme X2O body fuel transform water into a powerful alkaline beverage, which fights against the physical stress caused by today’s fast-paced lifestyles. For optimum health and long-term wealth visit bestxooma.com/ bestxooma.com for more information.

What is the South Beach Diet and what are its benefits and its drawbacks? The South Beach Diet is the creation of cardiologist Arthur Agatston, MD, director of the Mount Sinai Cardiac Prevention Center in Miami Beach, Fla. And like the Atkins Diet, Dr. Agatston’s South Beach Diet also limits the intake of carbohydrates as well as including a severely restrictive two week induction phase that is followed by a long term diet. So this means that potatoes, fruit, bread, cereal, rice, pasta, beets, carrots, and corn are no longer allowed, especially during the induction phase. So, with the aforementioned similarities, you may be wondering where Atkins and South Beach actually differ.

First of all, while Atkins promotes the obscene consumption of saturated animal fats, South Beach bans all unhealthy fats while, on the other hand, promoting the consumption of healthier unsaturated fats. The other difference can be found in their opposing views of carbohydrates. The South Beach diet doesn’t count grams of carbohydrates and low-sugar carbs are actually recommended. Therefore, South Beach is unable to be pegged as simply as “low-carb” unlike the Atkins diet, and it’s stance on fats disqualifies it from being labeled a “low-fat” diet as well. One of the more beneficial points that the South Beach Diet makes is for people to snack throughout the day so that hunger pangs are offset and their metabolism remains elevated. Actual meal portions will be just large enough to satisfy one’s hunger but no larger. Another point that many diets such as South Beach are stressing is insulin control by eating less refined carbs and more complex, fiber-rich carbs that will keep your energy levels high and your risk for diabetes low.

But what about this harsh induction phase? As mentioned above, one must begin the South Beach Diet with what they call an induction phase that lasts for 14 days. During these 14 days, one’s choices for food are limited greatly. Foods to avoid include bread, cereal, fruit, pasta, rice, potatoes, and alcohol. While one can have dairy products, only two servings of low-fat or non fat dairy are permitted during induction. Once the induction phase is over, and your carb cravings have waned, you can now begin to reincorporate some carbs back into the diet. However, most foods are still banned, but things like pasta can be had occasionally. This diet is maintained until you reach your target weight.

Now, South Beach is not as wonderful as Dr. Agatston would like for you to believe. In my opinion, any diet that includes a highly restrictive period that leaves people nutritionally unbalanced is not a good idea. Furthermore, most of the weight lost during induction turns out to be water weight, therefore disrupting the electrolyte balance and leaving you dehydrated. Lastly, the induction phase is a necessary stage, yet it is a nearly impossible challenge for many to go without grains, pasta, and fruit for two weeks. And for the uninitiated, this induction phase simply asks for too much too soon. So, Dr. Agatston’s heart appears to be in the right place, but one-size-fits-all diets like the South Beach Diet appear to be more trouble than they are worth.

Learn more about which is the best diet for you at PhenForum.com, the best site about phenforum.com Phentermine and healthy weight loss online! Join our support group to find a weight loss buddy. Learn more about how to lose weight permanently.