Ep. #251: How Much Water Should I Drink? A Simple & Science-Based Answer

[00:00:00] This episode is brought to you by me. Seriously though, I’m not big on promoting stuff that I don’t personally use and believe in. So instead, I’m going to just quickly tell you about something of mine. Specifically, my fitness book for women, Thinner, Leaner, Stronger. Now this book has sold over 150, 000 copies in the last several years and it has helped thousands of women build their best bodies ever, which is why it currently has over 1, 200 reviews on Amazon with a four and a half star average.

So if you want to know the biggest lies and myths that keep women from ever achieving the lean, sexy, strong, and healthy bodies they truly desire, and if you want to learn the simple science of building the ultimate female body, then you want to read Thinner, Leaner, Stronger, Today, which you can [00:01:00] find on all major online retailers like audible, Amazon, iTunes, Kobo, and play.

Now, speaking of audible, I should also mention that you can actually get the audio book 100 percent free when you sign up for an audible account, which I highly recommend that you do. If you’re not currently listening to audio books, I myself love them because they let me make the time that I spend doing things like commuting, prepping food, walking my dog and so forth.

Into more valuable and productive activities. So if you want to take Audible up on this offer and get my book for free, simply go to www. bitly. com slash free TLS book. And that will take you to Audible. And then you just have to click the sign up today and save button, create your account. And voila, you get to listen to thinner, leaner, stronger for free.

All righty. That is enough shameless plugging for now. At [00:02:00] least let’s get to the show. Hey, Mike Matthews here from muscle for life and legion athletics. And in this video podcast, we’re going to talk water consumption. How much water should you be drinking every day and why? Okay, so let’s start with why is drinking water important?

It is important because water is the single most abundant molecule in your entire body. About 60 percent of your entire body weight is water and just about every physiological process that goes on in your body requires water. For example, water is a vital part of your body’s natural detoxification systems.

Water is used to help digest food and then shuttle nutrients into cells. Water is needed to keep your ears, your nose, and your throat moist. Water is needed to keep our joint cartilage lubricated and supple, which is a big part of preserving joint health. And brain cells also require a delicate balance of water and other chemicals to function properly.

And so then it’s really no surprise that our [00:03:00] body’s water status affects many aspects of our mental and physical health and performance. Studies show that as we become dehydrated, so as our body’s water levels get too low due to inadequate intake, it slows us down both mentally and physically. So our mental and physical performance declines.

Our mood can become depressed, constipation is common, and if this becomes a chronic situation, if we are chronically dehydrated, there’s evidence that this can actually increase our risk of heart disease, which is of course the number one killer in the world. And dehydration can be really tricky because it’s very easy to ascribe those symptoms to other things.

You could go crazy trying to figure out what’s wrong when you don’t realize that the only real issue is You’re not drinking enough water. Okay, so how much water should you be drinking? Your body loses water every day through various things like breathing, sweating, urinating, pooping, [00:04:00] and you have to replace what is being lost through drinking and eating.

And yes, that’s right. I said eating. Many people don’t realize that food is actually a significant source of water for many people. One study showed that here in America, The average person got about 22 percent of their daily fluids, their daily water intake, about 22 percent of it came from the foods that they ate.

And that makes sense when you realize that certain foods like fruits and vegetables in particular actually contain significant amounts of water. That said though, none of us are going to be getting enough water through just our food alone. So we have to supplement that intake, so to speak. with water or really any beverage.

Any beverage will count toward the water that your body needs, including caffeinated beverages as well. Like coffee, for example, some people say that caffeine is a strong diuretic. And so therefore when you drink a cup of coffee, the caffeine that it contains negates the water that’s providing. And that’s nonsense.

It’s just not true. [00:05:00] Yes. Caffeine does have a slight diuretic effect, but it is very weak. It is not nearly as strong as some people would have you believe. Any caffeinated beverages that you are drinking, the water contained in those beverages does count toward your total intake. So what should your total intake be?

I like to go by the Institute of Medicine’s recommendation, which boils down to about three quarters of a gallon to one gallon per day for adult men and women. And you should also keep in mind that if you sweat a lot in general, so let’s say you exercise, four to seven days a week and you are sweating a fair amount in your workouts, you probably are going to need to drink a bit more to replace the additional water that you are losing through the excessive sweating.

And just to be specific with it, most people are going to sweat out about three quarters of a liter to two liters of water per hour of exercise, depending on how intense the exercise is, depending on the climate. So if it’s being done outside in July in Florida, there’s gonna be a lot more [00:06:00] sweating than outside.

In here in Virginia, where I live in March, for example, and speaking of climate, you should also be keeping that in mind that if you are in a place like Florida in July, you know that within 30 seconds of going outside, you’re already sweating, whereas if you live in a place with more moderate climates, you may not sweat much at all throughout the day.

So again, you have to be thinking with that people that live in Florida, for let’s say six to seven, eight, nine months of the year, their water intake is going to need to be a bit higher than people in other areas of the country. People that live further North, for example, that don’t sweat basically instantly the second they step outside.

So again, to boil this down, if you just started with three quarters to one gallon of water per day, and then add it on top of that, let’s say a liter to a liter and a half for each hour of exercise, you’ll be good. So for me, for example, I drink about one and a half gallons of water per day. Sometimes it’s a little bit higher.

Sometimes it’s a little bit lower, but if you average it out, it would be about one and a half gallons per [00:07:00] day. Now, in terms of how to actually do that, you have a few options. Of course, you can drink tap water, which is the easiest option, but I personally wouldn’t do it because it seems every few months or so, a new study comes out highlighting the nasty stuff in a lot of tap water, ranging from bacteria to pharmaceutical drugs, to heavy metals and various types of poisonous chemicals.

And let’s face it tap water also tastes like shit. So that’s another problem, especially for me drinking a lot of it, right? Bottled water is an option, but it’s an expensive option. It’s going to be very expensive. If you’re looking to drink, let’s say a gallon of bottled water a day would not do that.

And research shows that Bottled water can be full of chemicals as well. In one study, for example they examined 18 different bottled waters from 13 different companies and they found over 24, 000 chemicals present in the water, including endocrine disrupting chemicals. [00:08:00] Not good. And then you have water filtration, of course, which is my personal choice.

We have a good reverse osmosis filter at the office and also have it here at my house. And it’s from a company, I guess it’s pure water systems. com. The name of the company is probably pure water systems. Obviously I haven’t even looked, got recommended to me by a friend who’s super into just health in general.

And he was impressed with this filter because it removes everything from the water. That water. Tests out at zero parts per million, zero PPM. It’s very clean water removes fluoride as well. And if I remember correctly, I want to say the filter system itself was expensive, about a thousand dollars or so.

But you have to change the filters once every six months and those are cheap. And we’ve had the same system now running at the office. At least that system has been running for years and it gets used a lot. We run through gallons every day and no problems. So I’m not getting paid to promote them, but good product, purewatersystems.

com is [00:09:00] what I personally use. Now, if that’s too expensive, they may have a cheaper option. Actually one that just is like a countertop device. I’m not sure you can check it out, but even if they do in the, that’s too expensive, then check out the zero water ZP 0 1 0. That is a great, simple Brita like filter that just does a better job.

Hey, quickly, before we carry on, if you are liking my podcast, would you please help spread the word about it? Because no amount of marketing or advertising gimmicks can match the power of word of mouth. If you are enjoying this episode and you think of someone else who might enjoy it as well, please do tell them about it.

It really helps me. And if you are going to post about it on social media, definitely tag me so I can say, Thank you. You can find me on Instagram at muscle for life fitness, Twitter at muscle for life and Facebook at muscle for life [00:10:00] fitness. Okay. So a couple of odds and ends here, water and weight loss.

Many people say that drinking water frequently or drinking a lot of water speeds up your metabolism because your body has to heat it up and expend energy and therefore that will help you lose weight faster and not so much. A couple of studies have shown slight increases in metabolic rate and at least one study found Showed no such increase.

So that is even if it were to have that effect in your body, the effect is going to be so slight. It’s not going to matter. That said, research shows that drinking water is an effective way to increase satiety with your meals, which means that you stay fuller for longer and that of course makes it easier to stick to your diet.

So in that way, drinking enough water actually can help you lose weight faster. Another point worth mentioning is I do not recommend drinking calories because it does not trigger fullness like food does because it doesn’t have the same volume, it doesn’t keep your stomach full as long as food does, that’s the primary reason.

And so this is why you could drink a thousand calories of [00:11:00] whatever and be hungry an hour or two later, whereas eating a thousand calories of filling food is going to keep you full for many hours. And lastly, what about water status and muscle building? There is a relationship here. Staying hydrated is going to help you gain muscle faster.

And for two reasons, first studies show that hydration status does affect weightlifting performance and it affects it actually quite significantly. Generally speaking, the more dehydrated you are, the less strength you’re going to have and the less muscle endurance you’re going to have, which of course makes for worse workouts, makes it harder to progress.

And the harder it is to progress to heavier weights and have more volume, the harder it is to gain muscle. Of course. And the second point here is a, an interesting little bit of physiology because studies show that cell hydration status relates to protein synthesis and protein breakdown rates. And what’s happening here is that when a cell is dehydrated, it shrinks, [00:12:00] and that promotes protein breakdown.

And on the flip side, a hydrated cell swells, it expands, And that promotes protein synthesis. It doesn’t cause protein synthesis, but it is conducive to better protein synthesis. And as muscle growth is simply more protein synthesis than protein breakdown over time, the implications of this are clear.

Muscles that are well hydrated are simply going to perform better and grow faster than muscles that are not. Okay, so the bottom line here is if you are not currently getting enough water, you might be surprised at just how much you can benefit from drinking more. You might find that your mind is sharper and works better.

You might find that your mood improves. You might find that your digestion improves. You’re probably going to find that you do better in your workouts. You perform better in your workouts. You have more energy in your workouts. You don’t get as tired easily in your workouts. You are able to gain strength and gain reps.

[00:13:00] Faster in your workouts. And that of course over time will result in faster muscle gain. And you may also find that when you are cutting, you find it easier to stick to your diet and therefore it helps you lose fat faster. So if you want to make it easy, get a filter and get something that you can pour the water into and carry around like here at your desk at work.

For example, I use a stainless steel. container. It’s, I want to say it’s like a product, a one liter bottle and it’s stainless steel. And the reason why I went with stainless steel, because I just try to stay away from plastic because many plastics have many different chemicals that I don’t want to be putting into my body.

I’m going to get exposed to them to one degree or another, but I’d like to reduce my exposure as much as possible. And these are. particularly endocrine disrupting chemicals, which if you’re curious about learning about that, I have an interview with what’s his name was Jay. It’s Jay. So if you scroll down either on YouTube or in the iTunes feed, you’ll see an interview I [00:14:00] did a few months ago with a guy named Jay.

I forget his last name. Very smart guy, scientist that has, I spent a lot of time studying endocrine disrupting chemicals in particular, and one of the easiest ways that we can reduce our exposure to these chemicals is just cutting as much plastic as we can out of our lives. And so again, that’s why I use stainless steel and it’s a one liter stainless steel container or bottle and I just fill it up at the office.

I have it at my desk and I drink, let’s say four or five throughout the day. In addition to eating a few servings of fruits and vegetables and that’s it. My water intake is set. Hey there, it is Mike again. I hope you enjoyed this episode and found it interesting and helpful. And if you did, and don’t mind doing me a favor and want to help me make this the most popular health and fitness podcast on the internet, then please leave a quick review of it on iTunes or wherever you’re listening from.

This not only convinces people that they should check the show out, it also increases [00:15:00] its search visibility. And thus helps more people find their way to me and learn how to build their best bodies ever to. And of course, if you want to be notified when the next episode goes live, then just subscribe to the podcast and you won’t miss out on any of the new goodies.

Lastly, If you didn’t like something about the show, then definitely shoot me an email at mike at muscleforlife. com and share your thoughts on how you think it could be better. I read everything myself and I’m always looking for constructive feedback, so please do reach out. Alright, that’s it.

Thanks again for listening to this episode and I hope to hear from you soon. And lastly, this episode is brought to you by me. Seriously though, I’m not big on promoting stuff that I don’t personally use and believe in. So instead I’m going to just quickly tell you about something of mine, specifically my fitness book for women, thinner, leaner, stronger.

Now this book has sold over 150, 000 copies in the last several years. [00:16:00] And it has helped thousands of women build their best bodies ever, which is why it currently has over 1, 200 reviews on Amazon with a four and a half star average. So if you want to know the biggest lies and myths that keep women from ever achieving the lean, sexy, strong, and healthy bodies they truly desire.

And if you want to learn the simple science of building the ultimate female body, then you want to read Thinner, Leaner, Stronger today, which you can find on all major online retailers like Audible, Amazon, iTunes, Kobo, and Google Play. Now, speaking of audible, I should also mention that you can actually get the audio book 100 percent free when you sign up for an audible account, which I highly recommend that you do.

If you’re not currently listening to audio books, I myself love them because they let me make the time that I spend doing things like commuting, prepping food, walking my dog and so forth into more valuable and productive [00:17:00] activities. So if you want to take audible up on this offer and get my book for free, simply go to www.

bitly. com slash free TLS book, and that will take you to audible. And then you just have to click the sign up today and save button, create your account. And voila, you get to listen to thinner, leaner, stronger for free.