sExcessive sweating during exercise: does it mean you’re in bad shape, does it mean you’re in great shape, or does it mean anything at all?
First of all, you have to figure out if your excessive sweating occurs only during increased physical activities or during every day normal activities as well.
If it’s happening during normal activities it doesn’t necessarily mean that there’s something wrong–what you ate and the temperature of your surroundings can have something to do with it.
There is, however, a condition called hyperhidrosis which occurs in around 1% of the population, and it really does cause excessive sweating. Since such a small percentage of people have it though the chances of this being the case for you is pretty slim.
Why We Sweat
Our bodies are always adjusting themselves, making sure we don’t have too much of this or too little of that. This process includes making sure we don’t overheat.

Of course there are other reasons why we drip: nervousness or fighting an infection for example, but for our purposes we’ll stick to sweating and physical fitness .
Simply put, our bodies sweat to bring down our body temperature during exercise. So you might think that your excessive sweating during exercise means something’s wrong when it really doesn’t.
Sweat glands, all 2-4 million of them, are either from theEccrine or Aproccine gland and they produce moisture on our skin that then evaporates, cooling us down. Sweat contains both water and sodium (salt) which you can sometimes taste on your lips when you sweat.
The harder you train, the more chances you’ll have excessive sweating during exercise which means, in most average healthy adults that your body is becoming more efficient at cooling itself down.
Take a look at athletes. Anyone remember Micheal Jordan? That guy would sweat buckets. For some reason people think that the more you sweat the less physically conditioned you are, which isn’t the case.
Hydration
Whether you sweat a lot or not we can all become dehydrated from time to time. What you eat and the amount fluids you take in have a dramatic effect on your level of hydration. Your body is around 60-70 percent water and your blood is mostly water so you need to take in enough fluid every day.
So how much does the average healthy person need? A simple formula you can use is this: take your weight in pounds and divide that number in half and that’s roughly how many ounces of water you need per day.
So a 200 pound man would need to drink about 100 ounces, or 12.5 cups, per day. Don’t drink it all in one sitting though, you need to drink throughout the entire day so sip instead of guzzling.
How Do You Know if You’re Dehydrated?
One of the easiest ways to tell if you’re dehydrated is to look at your urine. If it’s brown or has an amber color and a strong odor that’s a sure sign that you’re dehydrated.
If you feel thirsty you’re already slightly dehydrated. This is why you should be sipping throughout the entire day–so that you don’t feel thirsty.
You should also make sure that you’re eating lots of fruits and vegetables because your body absorbs water more easily from food, especially fruits and vegetables with high water content (apples,pears,oranges,tomatoes) than it does just drinking a glass of water.
If you plan on training try to drink about 15-20 fl oz, 2-3 hours before working out, 8-10 fl oz 10-15 minutes before working out, and make sure to sip more fluids during your workout.
It’s better for your heart as well if you don’t let yourself get really thirsty and then drop a water bomb on it while you’re training.
So as you can see excessive sweating during exercise it really doesn’t mean that you’re in poor shape at all, it means your body’s cooling system works just fine so embrace the sweat knowing that it’s just doing it’s job.

Researched By : Kátia C. Rowlands – Pilates Instructor & Personal Trainer – 082 513 4256 •