8 Vital Reasons You Need to Hydrate Before Doing a Workout

What's the secret to a great workout? You might be surprised to find that you already have one of the most important elements - a drink. There are eight vitally important reasons to hydrate before a workout.

1- Nutrient Delivery

You probably leverage a variety of healthy meals and supplements as part of your fitness routine. However, getting those nutrients where they're needed depends on your circulatory system. And your circulatory system requires hydration to maintain peak blood volume and transportation efficiency.

2- Post Workout Recovery

The effectiveness of a workout isn't just about what kind of exercise you're focused on. Building muscle is something that largely happens after the exercise is already over. You push your body to new heights and then build your muscles up stronger than ever afterward. But to build muscle your body needs optimal access to its resources. Staying hydrated ensures that your body can deliver muscle-building elements to your muscles.

3- Optimize Tempreture for Effective Workouts

Heat can provide many of the same benefits as exercise even when you're just relaxing. It's even possible to reap more benefits by leveraging heat as a workout aid. However, your body needs to be able to sweat if it's going to reap those rewards. Hydration is how you ensure that your body can get the most out of heat-based fitness.

4- Longer Workouts

Endurance is an important part of an effective workout. The longer you can keep going the better your gains. Staying hydrated helps your circulation, thermoregulation, and more. Those elements translate into increased endurance and longer workouts.

5- Protect Against Heat Exhaustion

Working up a good sweat is an important part of a workout. However, if your body isn't able to produce enough sweat then you can fall prey to heat exhaustion. This isn't just a threat to your workout, it's a threat to your health. Hydrating before a workout ensures your body has what it needs to sweat.

6- Improve the Quality of Your Workout

Your performance during a workout is determined by many different factors. However, proper cardiovascular function is one of the most significant of those elements. A steady, rapid, heartbeat means that your body is keeping up with your desire to push yourself, and cardiovascular function is heavily tied to hydration.

7- Staying Focused and Alert

Effective workouts are just as much about the mind as they are about the body. You need to be able to rationally decide when you're finished with a workout and when you can push yourself a little further. It's a delicate balancing act that becomes increasingly difficult throughout a session. However, staying calm under physical pressure requires hydration. Your mind suffers when your thermoregulatory system can't keep up with the workout.

8- Safely Feeling the Burn

Raising your core body temperature burns more calories, leading to more effective workouts. But to do it safely you need to be able to properly leverage your body's natural thermoregulatory system - sweat. Just as calories fuel a workout, water powers your ability to regulate temperature.