Fact or Fiction: The Impact of Cold Water on your Metabolism

For those of you who seem to constantly tend to your diets and are on a mission to lose weight, you know the benefits of a speedy and efficient metabolism. There are various health benefits to drinking water as we have mentioned in multiple previous article. Everything, from our skin to our internal organs, is highly dependent on adequate water consumption. Here, we will learn an additional benefit of drinking water, which is the impact that it can have on our metabolism. Our metabolic health can help us achieve weight loss goals and improve the function of how our body processes and repairs itself.

Understanding Your Metabolism

In order to understand how to boost your metabolism, you must first learn what metabolism actually is. Most people simply use it as a buzzword, without knowing the first thing about how your metabolism works. In a previous article, we discussed the concept of diet thermogenesis and metabolism works in a similar way. For every calorie that you consume through food or beverages, your body then uses calories to break down those consumed calories during the digestion process. These calories are burned by raising the temperature of the calories consumed. For each gram that is raised by one degree Celsius, the body burns one calorie. Therefore, the whole theory of iced water being a metabolism booster comes from the concept that colder foods and drinks have to have their temperature raised even higher, thus burning more calories.

Ice Water and Calories

You may have heard claims that drinking iced cold water speeds up your metabolism. Well, research actually tends to support this claim as studies have found that those who drink ice water consequently burn more calories than control groups. In fact, some research shows that one can burn up to 30% more calories from adequate ice water consumption. This occurs for the reason previously mentioned on how your metabolism works.

Studies have also shown that the amount that you consume matters as well. In a study conducted at the University of Utah, researchers found that participants who drank 12 glasses of water (vs. 4 glasses in the comparison group) had higher metabolic rates.

Weight Loss and Water

Water is good for your digestive system in general, as it helps break down foods and keep them at a consistency that is manageable for your intestines. Drinking water regularly will help your body avoid digestive problems as well as promote extra calorie burning.

In addition to the digestive benefits of hydration, water also helps promote energy. This is crucial to weight loss efforts, especially when considering the energy needed to bust through those fat burning exercises.

Let’s not forget that water also helps you feel full for longer periods of time. In fact, when some people feel hungry, their bodies are actually thirsty, rather than hungry. Drinking adequate amounts of water can allow you to avoid cravings and over eating.

Ice Water Tips

Since you should already be consuming the recommended eight glasses of water per day, make these eight-ounce servings ice cold. By doing this, instead of drinking water closer to room temperature, you will burn about 70 calories in the process.

Drink with Lemon: Squeezing some lemon can help detoxify the liver and clarify mucous and other toxins that are left in the body

Drink the AM: Timing is also important as starting your day off with a fresh iced water may waken your metabolism and ignite your body’s engine so that it continues to burn throughout the day.

Drink after a workout: Continuously drinking water during a workout is important to staying hydrated, but the time period after you leave the gym is just as critical.

Considerations 

You also want to make sure that you are not drinking too much iced water either too frequently or too soon. This can lead to dropping of your overall body temperature, which is dangerous. In other sever cases of too much water consumption, there is the possibility of water intoxication, but this is very rare.

Another potential health harm is hyponatremia, which occurs when your electrolyte levels are out of balance, sodium in particular. Excess water can be the cause of this imbalance, so you will want to make sure to monitor appropriate levels of consumption.

The best way to boost your metabolism, especially with the goal of weight loss, is to incorporate an appropriate diet and exercise regimen. Although these ice water tips may allow you to burn a few more calories per day, diet and fitness are even more effective than doing this alone. Drinking ice water is a sensible tool to add to an already sensible diet and fitness level. Make sure to consider these tips and considerations while doing so.