The Best Drink to Stay Hydrated Is . . . Skim Milk?
What do you think the best drink is if you're trying to stay hydrated? Regular water? Gatorade? Maybe Pedialyte? Well, the correct answer is none of those. The most hydrating thing you can drink is . . . SKIM MILK.
Researchers looked at 13 different drink options, and how well they kept people hydrated over the course of four hours. And regular water barely made the top 10.
Plain old water basically goes straight through us, because it doesn't have nutrients and electrolytes to help our bodies absorb it. So most of it ends up in our bladder.
Skim milk is 91% water, but also has sugar, sodium, protein, and a tiny bit of fat, which all help slow down that process. So more of the water gets absorbed into your body.
According to the study, here are the ten most hydrating drinks, in order: Skim milk . . . Pedialyte . . . whole milk . . . orange juice . . . soda . . . diet soda . . . iced tea . . . regular tea . . . sports drinks . . . and regular water in 10th place.
There's one important thing to note though: The study specifically looked at how hydrated people stayed for four hours. But on a longer timeline, drinks with a ton of sugar . . . like soda and juice . . . DON'T hydrate you as well as water does.
When high amounts of sugar hit your small intestine, they start pulling water out of your body. So a glass of water is still a better option than a Pepsi.
(CNN)