Did people walk around with water bottles or sports beverages in 1960’s and 1970’s? Over hydration is a serious prob

You wear aqua-socks and a t-shirt in the pool, don't you.

Your body comes equipped with a sensation called "thirst". I suggest you ignore all the noise and let your sensation of thirst guide when to drink liquids. For me, if I'm doing a longer run in hot weather I might stop several times if water fountains are available, but I won't die if they aren't.

Exception would be long races especially the marathon, in those you should hydrate long before you feel thirsty.

True. Some of my football coaches would not allow water as they said it would give you stomach cramps or make you lazy.

That was before "public health" campaigns convinced everyone salt was bad. If you're not limiting salt intake, you won't likely go hyponatremic except in very hot weather

Just eat your electrolytes

...and what is the issue with walking around with a bottle.

We drank from taps, glasses , hoses whatever in the 70's, now we drink from bottles. The thirst receptors of humans haven't changed in 50 yrs...still drinking the same amount

In the 60’s the football coach at our school made everyone take salt tablets.

AND wouldn’t allow drinking from the water hose during practice

He even yelled at an assistant coach for getting a drink….1962 ( my dad was the assistant coach)

i don’t recall anyone dying and that’s a suprise.

This thread… wow… are people really THAT bent out of shape over others drinking water/hydrating? Must be exhausting being the OP and those who agree with the initial post. Goodness gracious.

You certainly need more salt if you are sweeting exclusively. Telling this to someone who drips out puddles of sweat at the gym is asking for trouble.

I was around in the 1960s. People would have thought it was weird and a waste of money to pay for a bottle of water. There were drinking fountains and taps.

Not really, this over hydrating mindset has spread through the US military. When I was in they were constantly nagging us about drinking more water, they made us bring a camelback to every PT (imagine the slowest imaginable pace shuffling just a tad above a speed walk, yeah they'd made us bring a camelback for that) and they always thought cramping was only caused by not drinking enough water and never discussed other reasons for cramping.

Hydration is like gluten, mostly a normal good thing though some people can overhydrate and some can have gluten allergy, and still others pretend to have gluten allergy and keep obsessing about hydration because they are really trying to lose weight.

Mostly I hear from suburban women about how "most people are dehydrated" and that's why they have X health problem.

It's complete BS.

Coaches denying water to athletes to "make em tough!" is wrong headed (obviously) but gulping down a stomach full of water, then trying to do a hard work out is a great way to puke, cramp, or perform poorly. So there's some truth to limiting how much you drink when working out for optimal performance.

I don't care what or when people drink, I was just telling it like it was when I was younger.

My wife is a fitness trainer, so I get to see both the good and bad of the fitness industry.

Current wisdom is that most people don't drink enough, the current goal says shoot for 1 gallon a day, so people lug the bottle around to help track/reach the target. Unless it's summer a gallon feels like a lot. I have tried to hydrate better with a glass of water at bfast, lunch, dinner, bedtime...

Now the humor, anything invented for fitness that looks cool, but causes no pain will be a big hit.

expensive earpods, sunglasses, gloves, tape, water bottle, hr monitor, tights & legwarmers, gels all look great and don't hurt, 10 x 400m, extra sets of hamstring curls to exhaustion, etc cause pain, so you won't see these much.