If I'm out for more that hour and I just drink just water I get cramping in my calves. It doesn't matter if I'm cycling or x-country skiing. I find that anything other than plain water, dilute juice or gatorade or whatever works fine for sessions of more than an hour.

If it's less than that, water seems to be fine unless it's really warm and/or I'm sweating more than usual. It depends on what I'm doing.


Eating a lots of fresh fruits and vegetables, whole grains, not too much red meat helps as well. Bananas, which are high in potassium works well for me.

As for cutting back on the sodium, I'm all for it. There's way too much sodium in everything anyway.