dehydration

for the longest time, i had myself convinced that whatever torture i put my body through now would make future runs easier. this included distance, intensity, and physical readiness of my body for each run. oftentimes, i would go out for a 6 to 8 miler having had nothing to eat or drink for a good period of time. even worse, i would go for 12 milers on a hot summer afternoon with no water. by the time i would get finished with these, i was barely sweating and my pee was the color of apple juice (bet you don't look at that stuff the same way anymore). these runs would hurt, but i'd get through them and be proud of myself for having done so. now you might be saying to yourself "what an idiot" but my logic had me convinced that if i wasn't dead or feeling like i was endangering myself, then i must be helping myself. kind of a 'whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger' thing.

it turns out that i was VERY wrong. according to the gatorade folks, if you are dehydrated by 1%, your performance suffers 10%. if you are dehydrated by 5%, your performance suffers by 40% and you are almost guaranteed to damage yourself.

as you exercise you create both peruvic acid (aerobic exercise) and lactic acid (anaerobic exercise). when you sweat, you lower the ability of cells to dispose of it. the combination of these two items causes acid buildup and changes the pH in your body. neurons don't like acidity so much and fire a lot more slowly when there is a high pH (a.k.a. fatigue). this explains why, after a good hard run, i feel drunk. alcohol, just like acidity, is a depressant (i don't know the chemistry behind alcohol but it wouldn't surprise me if it had a similar pH effect).

What is really scary is that long term exposure to changes in your bloodstream pH will cause your muscle structure pH to change (for as long as a month!). you end up slowing yourself down instead of speeding up because you neurons are constantly taking a bath in lactic acid.


jeez, and you thought tsandhol had boring crap. =)