Hi,
You’re telling me to wake up in the morning, not drink water, and then go workout…
Thom, you’ve lost your mind.
Let me start of by saying that this was not my idea… although I have done it before, and surprisingly noticed some increases in my performance.
The research needs to still be flushed out a bit, but the whole concept of working out mildly dehydrated has started to gain some attention since UFC Champ Valentina Shevchenko mentioned it on Joe Rogan a couple weeks back.
The potential mechanisms actually make some sense:
By being in a mildly dehydrated state, you potentially increase the amount of blood plasma. This would mean that you potentially have more blood volume.
This happens as a result of sort of a compensatory mechanism to cool off the extremities when it gets the signal that you’re dehydrated or overheating.
This could mean that you’re delivering more blood to a given area of the body with every beat of the heart. This is due to Flow-Mediated-Dilation of the vessels.
There’s interesting research on it – Here’s one published in ‘Temperature’ – STUDY
What does this mean happens?
More O2 to the muscle could mean more power.
More O2 to the muscle could mean more stamina
COULD mean more fatty acid utilization, and so on…
So what do I recommend?
Well, I have to be careful telling anyone to go out and do a strenuous workout in a dehydrated state, but what I do personally is fair to share:
I workout in the morning, so it’s easy for me too get up in the morning 3 days out of the week and essentially roll right out of bed and get into training. I’ll still have a small, concentrated cup of coffee with about 1/3 cup of water on these days.
I begin my warm-up as usual, but mind you I am ONLY mildly dehydrated since I only stopped drinking fluids about 10 hour prior.
Half my workout is done without consuming fluids and the second half I consume electrolytes (I use LMNT packets because they taste the best – here’s a link to get a sample pack of them for free – just pay shipping –
I would rather the fluids that I do bring in during my workout be concentrated with minerals. Because you’re dehydrated, it is the opportune time to dilute your existing mineral levels in your body. So the morning is the most important time of day to add sodium, potassium, and magnesium into the mix.
I find that this allows me to still be in somewhat of a dehydrated state throughout the rest of my workout so that I reap the benefit of this whole idea.
And, I stress not to do it every day either. I do it 2-3x per week.
With every stressor, there is an adaptation, but it is our responsibility to find where that hormetic curve and stressor has a line of diminishing return, and even worse, dangerous setbacks.
At least if I supplement some minerals during a (again I cannot overemphasize the word MILD enough) dehydrated training session, I still feel like I get the proper fluid to the muscle as well as neurological effect that I need for a good workout.
So don’t think that I have lost my marbles. I am sure some people are going to take this to the bank and write on Reddit that I am telling people that water is bad for them now, ha!
This is just one more thing to keep in your toolbox, especially when it comes down to performance.
And a big thank you to LMNT for offering up the FREE sample packets of their Electrolytes so that my viewers and readers can try them. Again, that special link is here for 8-Free sample packs (just pay shipping) – Get the Free Sample Packs Here
As Always, I will see you tomorrow and if you want to learn more on this, keep glued to my channel, but here is a partial video breakdown that I did on this topic: Video Response to Valentina Shevchenko’s Diet and Hydration Strategy
See you tomorrow!
