by John Bladon

Swimmers need to bring a water bottle to training, with some kind of drinkable fluid in it. The question is which is the best fluid? In general a fluid that the swimmers will drink is best. After this:

Water is best for the swimmer exercising 90 minutes or less a day. Include all sport in this calculation, especially school sport.

When exercising over 90 minutes a day the best option is water and a sports drink. The water should be consumed at the start of the session and the sports drink towards the end of the session.

Swimmers training twice a day (or every day) need to recover quickly from session to session. A quick recovery allows the coach to train the swimmers harder each session. A fresh swimmer also learns skills easier and is motivated because they are not tired.

Swimmers can recover quicker by eating or drinking immediately after training. There is a 15 minute window where the body is primed for recovery following exercise. Having timed the gold squad swimmers that brought food with them they still took 20 minutes to eat it following training. This is OK, but not the best practice. The time it takes to have a chat, climb out, have a chat, put the equipment bags away, have a chat, get changed while having a chat and then finally eat something while chatting is too long.

A sports drink can assist quick consumption and improved recovery. Having researched the types available in Australia the best one I can recommend is:

Musashi : Electrolyte Replacement Formula “E”. This can be found at health stores in powder form. Swimmers can make it up.

| Sports drinks are all similar; they nearly all contain 8-9% simple sugars and electrolytes. This is ideal for quick recovery. The e formula I believe is the best as it has a few added ingredients such as protein and antioxidants.

Therefore in an ideal world all swimmers would bring a bottle with drinkable water in it (small amounts of cordial can be added to make more palatable).

In addition swimmers that train every day would bring a sports drink as recommended. Some swimmers find it hard to drink fluid during training. 2 standard size water bottles of fluid is adequate for 120 minutes of hard swimming training at MLC, 1 bottle for 90 minutes of moderate training.

I believe that the swimmers should take responsibility for preparing to train. Organising their drinks (where possible) should be encouraged. It will not happen immediately for some, but this is a part of the learning curve.

The next challenge is getting the swimmers to drink it!

Hope this helps, John.