Uni-Vibe

Been doing 50-60 mile rides lately, temps in the forties. Over that distance I'm drinking, at most, 1.5 large water bottles. I can go the first 30 miles w/o drinking anything at all.

Is that not enough? Or do I just let my thirst tell me what to do?

MrTuner1970

I need more. Generally, I try to stay a bit ahead of my thirst. In colder temps, one bottle every 20-25 miles.

kayakdiver

I have a bad habit of not drinking enough in the winter... I have to force/remind myself to drink the whole ride when it's between the 30's and 50's.

datlas 

I generally drink 1 bottle/hour, in the winter sometimes this drops by a third but still important to stay hydrated....although I don't think the OP is doing anything dangerous or harmful.

I do suggest you take a few sips every 15 minutes, even early on in your rides.

Bo-Ridley

OT. Your consumption is very similar to mine. Below that 30F I might drink less than 1/2 bottle in 40 miles.

RacerOne

A bottle an hour is my preference, temperature shouldn't matter.

Machka 

Pretty much the same as what you'd drink in summer ... one 750 ml bottle every 1 to 1.5 hours.

umd

It really depends on how hard you are working and how much clothes you are wearing. Since you are in Texas, it makes sense that it would be much hotter in the summer and you would sweat much less in the winter unless you are bundled up. It's all about how warm your core gets and how well you cool yourself off, so in the winter you likely have much better cooling, and if you are like many people don't ride as hard anyway.

You want to stay ahead of thirst, but if you come back from a ride and are not overly thirsty then you probably did ok. The best thing to do is weigh yourself before and after the ride, and if you didn't lose a bunch of weight then you are fine. I know in the summer I really have to stay on top of hydration and on super hot days, not matter how much I drink, I may lose a ton of water weight. On cold days (40s-50s) I can ride all day on little or no water and hardly lose any weight. so the answer is... it depends.

umd

Fail for your generic one-size-fits all advice.

bismillah

Weigh yourself before and after rides. If you weigh less afterwards, drink more.

carpediemracing 

I read somewhere that it's virtually impossible to keep up with fluid loss on a hard ride.

For me, I drink enough to chase away cramps, and I need electrolyte drinks to do that. I'll drink zero calorie electrolyte drinks (Powerade Zero for example) on shorter rides, like under 2 hours. For really long rides, over 3-4 hours, I'll use sugar versions. Longer rides I also eat, and I pretty much eat what I feel like eating. Last two long rides I had Pop Tarts from a convenience store. One of them I supplemented with granola bars. I didn't crave peanuts like normal, or pb&cheese crackers - I figure that's because I was drinking a lot of electrolytes.

On rides where I'm afraid of bonking I'll try and take in 200-300 cal/hour average per hour. I figure I'm burning closer to 500 cal/hour unless I'm going really hard, then it's like 700+/hour.

cdr

Daytrip

I find myself drinking about half as much on my cold-weather rides, primarily because I'm not sweating as much, and that's by design. I do keep up with the electrolytes in other ways, however, as I believe they contribute to a comfortable ride.

As a practical matter, when it's below freezing, my water bottle is going to freeze up after about an hour anyway, so I try to front-load my hydration. Starting out with hot water helps; I'm not motivated enough to get an insulated bottle or wear a camelbak under my jacket.

saratoga

Each person varies so much, there is no OSFA rule.
Some people are like camels and hardly need to sip on anything, others need as much as they can take in to keep the crippling effects of dehydration from slowing them down. Let your own personal experience and feelings on rides guide your fluid intake (not just your thirst).

^^I tend to agree that it's practically impossible to stay fully hydrated on hard rides or races, esepecially in temps where you sweat profusely. You can delay dehydration by taking in fluids, but it just seems physically impossible to take in the same quantity of fluids you lose- without getting sick that is.

FWIW I typically go through 1.5 24 oz bottles per hour. More if the temps are high.

silversx80

Think about it this way...

You give off a lot of mass in the CO2 you exhale, as well as water vapor and other waste (most urinated or sweated out) formed from you metabolism stream. If I weigh the same after a ride, and haven't eaten anything, that means that I have more water, less electrolytes and salts, and less triglycerides (fat) than when I left. Some is left over lactic acid (C6H3O6, IIRC) too.

My last outdoor ride (about 80 minutes) was around 1300 kJ (a little over 1300 calories @ 23% eff). It was in the low 40s on average, I weighed 0.5 lbs lighter when I got back and only drank half a water bottle (24 oz bottles). I wasn't thirsty.

My last hard indoor (trainer) ride was a little over 1100 kJ (80 minutes). I drank a full 24 oz of water, formed a puddle of sweat on the ground and was 2 lbs lighter. I was thirsty until I drank another 20 oz of water; about 1.25 lbs of water.


I drink a lot of water on hot days. My last long ride in 90 degree weather I drank over 1.5 gallons and still weighed 4 lbs lighter than start.

In short:

Go by feel.

Jakedatc

Just wanted to add that even though you aren't dripping and feeling sweaty in the winter doesn't mean that you aren't. The air is much drier in the winter and evaporation is much more efficient so it disappears faster. and because you don't feel thirsty has nothing to do with hydration.. you still need to keep on it. going 30mi without anything is asking for trouble later and you will have a hard time catching up (especially since it's cold and you aren't thirsty anyway) . sure it won't be 100% of what you'd use on a hot summer day but maybe closer to a comfortable day.

lol at "losing mass due to loss in CO2" you know that you aren't storing CO2 anywhere.. it's just a biproduct of the O2 you are bringing in and using

silversx80

Oh boy, I don't even know where to start. Where do you think the "C" comes from?



... hint: you store C, H and O in one form or another. Triglycerides (stored body fat), for example are just Carbon, Hydrogen and Oxygen.

umd

The air is not necessarily drier in winter, some of us don't live in humid climates. For people in desert areas like California an Texas it is always relatively dry.

RomeRider

Most of my winter rides are shorter and I don't drink much. I think you need to replace a lot more fluid in the Summer because you're losing so much more. I begin each day with a large glass of water that I drink while I'm having my quiet time. I drink a little more before I leave the house. I don't need to drink again during a 30 to 40 minute ride in the Winter and I usually have to use the bathroom when I get to work.

Daytrip

The air in your house is drier during the winter because of the heat differential between the outdoors and indoors. Relative humidity is a function of air temp. That's what makes it relative. I don't believe it's usually drier outside in general during the winter, so the conditions relating to losing moisture you mentioned while exercising don't really apply. I sweat plenty (and notice it) when exercising in cold weather if I don't take steps to stay dry.

NickDavid

I think you're fine with that amount, but only your body will know for sure. Make sure you're eating regularly too. I find myself getting extremely tired and cramping on cold days if I don't eat and drink. Blah, just a couple more months of this crap.

rumrunn6

1 water bottle per hour of saddle time. I stay away from Gatorade and get my nutrients including electrolytes with supplements. at the volume I consume water it makes the most sense.

it is tempting to drink less on cold weather days, and more on exceptionally hot days. in fact, to some degree, this intuitive fluctuation is probably based in good science. I think I read somewhere that if it's reallly hot and you're sweating alot, but mostly because it's really hot - health professionals encourage a higher hydration rate. so maybe the converse is true?

umd

Ultimately how much water someone should consume is a function of how much of the body's water is lost through respiration and sweat. The body sweats as a cooling mechanism, so the amount of sweat is driven by the core temperature and the effectiveness of the cooling. Colder ambient temperature results in a greater differential which means more effective cooling through radiation and less dependence on evaporation. Additionally, drier air makes for more effective evaporation of sweat, and therefore more efficient cooling per the same volume of sweat.

Bottom line is that, all else being equal, the body will not lose as much water through sweat in colder and drier air, and you will therefore not need to replace as much. Respiration is not a major means of cooling and the amound of water lost is more a factor of metabolic activity.

Now, the monkey wrench in all of this is that all things are not always equal, and the amount of clothing is not consistent. When you wear more clothing you are affecting your body's ability to regulate it's core temperature. During activity, you produce a lot of wasted energy as heat which raises your temperature unless your body can radiate it out into the surrounding environment, or evaporate sweat to produce a cooling effect. Clothes interfere with both radiation and evaporation. If you dress in layers you can remove clothes as needed to maintain effective cooling.

When I go out in 40, 50, 60 degree weather I generally dress for how I will feel after I am warmed up. Sometimes I am shivering for the first few minutes but then I am comfortable for the rest of the ride. Often in borderline conditions I will start out dressed a little warmer such as arm & knee warmers and remove them during the ride, so that I ways remain at a comfortable temperature. Of course then, if you realize that I am generally riding with a similar level of clothing in 50 degrees compared to 100 degrees, it makes perfect sense that I would sweat far less on a cold day than on a hot one. If your own experience is different, it comes down to how much clothing you are wearing.

Velo Vol 

Most of my cold rides are in the 20-25 mile range, and I don't drink anything while riding.

Daytrip

As umd says, layers allow you to maintain the best body temp. The vast majority of my rides start out with more than 5 miles of mostly uphill riding. After that, it's a mixture, followed by another five miles of descent to get back home again. It took me awhile to figure out what to wear and when to put it on and take it off to avoid becoming soaked and freezing my ass off on the descents. Fortunately, the clothing available today (I use mostly XC ski stuff during winter riding) is light enough to where most everything will fit into my jersey pockets when I'm basically stripped down for the initial climb.

rumrunn6

I've been borderline (underdressed) a couple of times this winter and reached my destination just in time. not sure what I would do if I had a catastrophic failure that prevented me from riding it.