Relative Something

My cycling friends know all about this one. Hopefully, so do my soccer friends. Well, I hope all my family and friends know about maintaining proper hydration. My method of choice for monitoring my status is simply watching the color of my urine. I have been amazed lately, how quickly things can change. Clear, clear, clear, clear, whoa–yellow!

There isn’t a gradual change, but suddenly a dramatic change. Now, there are other clues, if I am paying attention. Certainly, frequency of needing to go is one. At work, if I don’t get interrupted by needing to visit the restroom multiple times per morning, I should know that when lunch break arrives, I may find a change of color, especially if I played soccer that morning. But when I’m busy at work and don’t get forced to take bathroom breaks, I notice that I also often don’t break to drink water either and then the drop in level of hydration appears.

But I still find myself surprised when the change happens, and often times when it does, at how significant the change of color can be. The good news is that when optimal hydration is being managed, changes like this can be very quickly remedied. I can easily polish off my 24 oz. bottle of water in short order and see immediate response in urine color and amount (or frequency).

It’s not so easy if allowed to get to the extreme of dehydration. I will always remember the time Lance Armstrong got dehydrated during a time trial in one of his Tour de France races and the next day they reported that even with intravenous fluids added to his attempts to drink enough after that day’s race, he was still not back to optimal hydration yet because the cells can only absorb water over time. You can’t put it all back at once. It pays not to let ourselves get behind.

Speaking of Lance, what a performance in this year’s Tour on Monday as he astutely positioned himself for a possible group breakaway that actually occurred and bought him some precious seconds to move from 10th place overall up to 3rd, while other contenders totally missed out and were gapped by over 30 seconds or more. Team Time Trial today!

I love watching le Tour!