Soccer Hydration – When & What to Drink

I recently read a study, which concluded that athletes' performance , to some extent, directly related to their level of hydration or dehydration. The better the body is hydrated, the better they will be able to keep their performance at a high level and fatigue will also settle in harder than with a person who is suffering from mild or acute dehydration.

Obviously, this is not the only factor that affects performance, but it's one of those small details that make up a whole. And as a soccer player, you'll want to take care of each detail in order to ensure that the whole, your performance, is intact by the time the ref blows his starting whistle.

I noticed that a lot of soccer player (especially younger ones) tend to put an equality sign between dehydration and thirst. Although both concepts face the same bodily requirement to replace fluids, thirst is a momentary situation that you can solve with a single drink, whereas dehydration is a chronic state. For example, you're lacking certain vitamins from your body and you're hungry. Eating a plateful of chicken wings may settle your hunger, but that doesn't mean that your vitamin problem will be solved.