Homemade “gatorade”

If you are working out, you need to replenish fluids regularly for optimum performance. Water is great for this, but if you’re working out longer than 45 minutes to an hour, there’s good reason to drink gatorade, for the salts, for the performance-enhancing carbs, and because that slightly troubling fruity sweat flavour somehow transforms into the elixir of the gods once you’ve worked up a sweat.

But gatorade comes in suspiciously gummy colours, is expensive, and is usually bought in a new plastic bottle every time. And if you read the ingredients you’ll quickly see that Michael Pollan wouldn’t approve. What if you are the kind of karate-ka who likes to “eat clean” and fill your water bottle with tap water?

Then you are the kind who might appreciate this homemade “gatorade” recipe. It’s so easy that I blush to call it a “recipe” and the ingredients are things you’ll likely have lying around anyway, or be able to get in your dorm’s dining hall on the way to training:

Homemade “gatorade”

1/2 cup orange juice
Then fill your bottle up with water.
3/4 teaspoon salt

That’s it.

Don’t think you’ll make some kind of super-gatorade by doubling or trebling the salt content – I tried that, not good. Ideally you want both sodium and potassium, so check and see what kind of salt you have. There’s potassium in orange and lemon juice, so if you have ordinary sodium chloride for salt you’re good.

Alternatively:

Fill your waterbottle with tea, add a little lemon juice and 4-6 teaspoons of sugar (or honey)
3/4 of a teaspoon of salt

Reducing the sugar gives you low-calorie “gatorade” but how useful that is depends on your goals, how much you’re drinking etc. The carbohydrate is an integral part of sports drinks and if you’re not using fruit juice you’ll need to get it from somewhere else.

Enjoy!