How much water do you drink?

[Bin Ont Turf]

You can probably find a doctor or report to back whatever you want to believe so who knows.

There was a feature on the radio about the modern office obsession with drinking gallons of water - the doctor they had on that day said you can drink loads of water if you like, it won't do you any harm unless you take it to extremes. But it won't do much either, other than make you wee and sweat more. Apparently you'll know when you need more water, you'll be thirsty. But if you reckon it's working, it's a cheap placebo if nowt else.

Definitely this.

It's good to keep hydrated but 3 litres a day is a bit of a nonsense.

[Claret-On-A-T-Rex]

I drink about 1 - 3 litres a day. I gave up drinking alcohol almost six years ago but then replaced it with Coke Zero (which I mistakenly believed was just Coke flavoured water) and then normal Coke. However, a friend pointed out I was heading for diabetes if I kept sticking so much sugar into my body so I swapped for carbonated water.
Now I just drink that and coffee.
Thankfully, since giving up smoking and bevvy I haven't had a cluster migraine and I reckon the water helps with too.

[Rowls]

When i were a lad the Charles Atlas course was very popular and even back then he recommended drinking large amounts of water.
https://www.charlesatlas.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Charle Atlas being a 1950s conman selling an unfeasible body image to skinny young lads.

Drinking water is a canny water to trick somebody that they're putting on weight by gaining muscle.

I'm a healthy weight (about 10st 5) and a good BMI but I bet I could "lose" or "gain" 6 pounds in 10 days with water retention.

[FactualFrank]

Charle Atlas being a 1950s conman selling an unfeasible body image to skinny young lads.

Drinking water is a canny water to trick somebody that they're putting on weight by gaining muscle.

I'm a healthy weight (about 10st 5) and a good BMI but I bet I could "lose" or "gain" 6 pounds in 10 days with water retention.

BMI.. almost useless.

It's Body Fat that's important, not BMI.

You'll never have heard of Visceral Fat - Google it.

[piston broke]

Charle Atlas being a 1950s conman selling an unfeasible body image to skinny young lads.

Drinking water is a canny water to trick somebody that they're putting on weight by gaining muscle.

I'm a healthy weight (about 10st 5) and a good BMI but I bet I could "lose" or "gain" 6 pounds in 10 days with water retention.

I mentioned on the slimming thread that water weight is my problem, brews not booze.
Exactly as I predicted I lost 8lbs in a week by cutting back to 4 a day. Then it gets harder as you are trying to break down fat. I also do weights so turn some fat to muscle which is heavier anyway.

[FactualFrank]

I mentioned on the slimming thread that water weight is my problem, brews not booze.
Exactly as I predicted I lost 8lbs in a week by cutting back to 4 a day. Then it gets harder as you are trying to break down fat. I also do weights so turn some fat to muscle which is heavier anyway.

You don't turn fat to muscle. You burn fat and gain muscle. One doesn't turn to the other.

You're correct though in that muscle weighs more than fat. It also needs more energy (calories) to exist, so it increases your metabolic rate.

[Rowls]

BMI.. almost useless.
It's Body Fat that's important, not BMI.
You'll never have heard of Visceral Fat - Google it.

BMI is a very useful measuring tool. No, it's not perfect but in the vast majority of people a quick and relatively easy coefficient to work out who is overweight and who is underweight.

[Rowls]

I mentioned on the slimming thread that water weight is my problem, brews not booze.
Exactly as I predicted I lost 8lbs in a week by cutting back to 4 a day. Then it gets harder as you are trying to break down fat. I also do weights so turn some fat to muscle which is heavier anyway.

You need to lower your salt intake to reduce your water retention. Work on slowly lowering your dietary salt and you will lose weight by losing water retention.

The problem with this is that food tastes better with salt. However, there is a lot more salt in processed foods - cut back on them and keep seasoning your home made food is my best advice for cutting back salt but keeping your food tasting good.

All the best!

[FactualFrank]

It isn't at all. I met up with a dietician and even she nodded and agreed that it isn't useful. Unless you have no knowledge at all about weight. It's what people with little knowledge use to measure whether they are overweight or not. You know if you're overweight or not - the scales tell you. It's pointless.

Is it as hell as like a very useful measuring tool.

[Cirrus_Minor]

Too much water is actually poisonous. More than that is drowning.

[Rowls]

It isn't at all. I met up with a dietician and even she nodded and agreed that it isn't useful.

I find that to be akin to saying something like "spanners are useless".

Sure.

If you're trying to use them as hammers, they're pretty crappy.

It's a tool.

BMI is an excellent tool for gauging weight problems.

[FactualFrank]

It isn't. And if you really believe it is, then I'm debating with the wrong person.

I can tell you've never heard of Visceral fat. Look it up, you might learn something. If you knew about it, you would never be banging on about BMI.

[piston broke]

You need to lower your salt intake to reduce your water retention. Work on slowly lowering your dietary salt and you will lose weight by losing water retention.

The problem with this is that food tastes better with salt. However, there is a lot more salt in processed foods - cut back on them and keep seasoning your home made food is my best advice for cutting back salt but keeping your food tasting good.

All the best!

I never add salt to anything and when on a diet avoid whites, sugar, pasta, bread, spuds and rice.
I get there in the end. Just need to eat less, train longer and get my metabolic rate up.

[piston broke]

I'm not a big fan of BMI but it does have a place. A caliper belly test is far better than height/ weight as some are heavy boned and some have shoulders like a shed. All of which gives false readings.

[Sidney1st]

Shoulders like a shed??

As in broad shoulders?

[Burnley loyal]

Iv heard that drinking 6 litres a day could kill you? Flood your brain or something??

[aggi]

If you neck 6 litres in a couple of hours and have also exercised heavily so your sodium levels are down then it can be dangerous. Six litres over the course of a day would generally be fine.

[LeadBelly]

" I'm not a big fan of BMI but it does have a place. A caliper belly test is far better than height/ weight as some are heavy boned and some have shoulders like a shed. All of which gives false readings."

An easy way to point out the shortcomings of BMI is to look at a top class rugby team (who tend to be in the "shed" mould) and work out their BMIs from published height/weight details. Current English team (maybe starting Saturday) BMIs:
Cole, Hartley, Mako: 32.3, 31.5, 37.1 - an all obese front row
Lawes, Launch: 27.8, 30.7 - overweight /obese border
Itoje, Hughes Robshaw: 30.2, 29.9, 30.8 overweight/obese border
Care, Ford: 27.8, 26.8 - middle ranking overweight
Farrell, Joseph 26.0, 26.9 - middle ranking overweight
Nowell, May, Brown: 30.2, 25.5, 27.5 - obese, just overweight, middling overweight.
Not one of them "normal"- though Johnny May is close.

Certainly the front three tend to carry a decent amount of "ballast" but the other lads seem predominantly muscular and fit & healthy.
Hopefully they can run around to some effect on Saturday afternoon in Edinburgh.

[Erasmus]

The trouble for rugby players is that when they retire from professional sport there is a good likelihood that they will become genuinely obese. It happens to quite a lot of ex-footballers as well.

[LeadBelly]

That's true Erasmus. Same for all active people used to using a lot of calories and having high metabolism. Get older, can't keep activity levels up, metabolism slows then you have to really adjust your diet or you will get jolly fat.
Especially so for people who deliberately had high body weight for their activity like rugby players but there are loads of chubby ex-footballers too as you say, sometimes almost unrecognisable 5-10 years after stopping playing. Maradona went to seed fairly quickly (Brolin whilst he was still playing!)

[ŽižkovClaret]

I generally stick to beer when possible, its cheaper

[Pstotto]

It's supposed to increase energy levels by 30% but it goes straight through me.

[Pstotto]

Ziz, drinking water is relatively new, as it was an unhealthy option.

[quoonbeatz]

jamie pollock is the benchmark for ex-footballers who have porked out massively.

[Pstotto]

Looks like he's on anti-psychotics.