If you want to succeed in any kind of competitive sports, it is important that you have an excellent energy level. Sports nutrition is a factor that any competitive and professional athlete should be aware of. The product that you use should be genuine and useful. It should come in neat package, taste good and look good. You need to have genuine sporting nourishment, with beneficial added ingredients. One type of product that athletes often consume is isotonic sports drinks. Just like other drinks, they are intended to provide our body with enough fluids. They should be able to replace salt and other kinds of minerals, or electrolytes. We lose these minerals during exercises. The term isotonic is used for fluids with salt and sugar levels that are equal to blood plasma. In order to encourage consumption, isotonic sports drinks often contain sugar and artificial flavoring. Some products are designed to be low in sugar, so they may contain aspartame and other types of artificial sweeteners.
Some of the sports drinks contain high level of caffeine, which is something that we shouldn’t have regularly at high levels. Fortunately, there are alternatives that we can get to replace the sports drinks. One of the best solutions is natural coconut water. This is a good solution for people in equatorial areas where coconut trees are common. Coconut should be quite affordable in these areas. Natural coconut water is a wonderful natural isotonic drink, which is much cheaper than any isotonic sport drink. Coconut water is rich in potassium, sodium and other minerals. In fact, coconut water can be used in emergency situations for intravenous infusion as replacement for blood plasma. Another option is to choose rehydration salt or dioralyte. It can be mixed with water easily. Rehydration salt is also cheap and easy to carry. Compared to isotonic sports drinks, water mixed with dioralyte shouldn’t contain any dangerous chemical.
We may also save some money by choosing squash or juice, added with little amount of sea salt. It should be quite easy to make a replacement from fresh juice. You can make fresh juice from mango, pineapple, banana and other tropical fruits; which are commonly rich in minerals. This is suitable for people who live in tropical areas. Your body will benefit significantly if you get fruit juice after performing intense and prolonged physical exercises. Again, because you lose a lot of minerals through sweat; you should still add some sea salt to the fruit juice. It is important to be aware that table salt is less appropriate, because it often contains only sodium and not other minerals like potassium. By adding some sea salt, the fruit juice may also taste better, but you still shouldn’t use sea salt too much. High quality sea salt can be obtained in various health shops and pharmacies. After using these alternatives, you can be sure that you are able to save some money. Depending on your body weight and level of physical activities, you have different amounts of electrolytes that need to be replaced. It is important to ensure that your body stays balanced.