Dehydration

It was good to see so many of our regular runners out this morning, and I was especially pleased that my FRP Martha (see July 4 post) ran five miles.  She has her sights set on some longer races, and gradually extending the mileage of the Saturday long run is exactly how to do that.  For my part, I am running ten miles on Saturdays and I intend to hold it there for a few weeks.

Nobody else seemed to be suffering, but today's ten miles was a difficult one for me.  I was not complaining, but I mentioned innocently and separately to Fred and John that, despite cloud cover and cool temperatures, it seemed a little humid.  They were quick to point out that they had both run (separately) in Atlanta this week where it was 90 degrees and the humidity nearly 100%.  So it was relatively humid in Highlands this morning, and I was dehydrated by a week of hot and humid running, day after day.

Dehydration can build up over a period of a few days, and all the water and sports drink in the world don't seem to help.  Because every time I passed a water fountain, I stopped and drank copiously.  And I went out of my way to pass water fountains.  Still, by the end of the day, I found I had dropped an amazing 4.5 pounds in weight, the equivalent of 72 ounces of fluid.

So my goal for the rest of the day is a simple one.  Keep a bottle of water at hand and drink from it as often as I can.  That is the new thinking about dehydration.  It does no good to force yourself to drink water.  Every distance runner knows about, or should know about, hyponatremia, which has finished off many an unprepared marathon runner.   And there is simply no way to replace 72 ounces of fluid in a short period of time.  It is far better to drink according to your thirst, and to have fluids handy for that purpose, throughout the day.

I suppose it it just another corollary to that old saying:  listen to your body.  We would all be better runners if we heeded that advice.