Hockey Hydration: Why a Cold Rink Produces One of the Highest Sweat Rates in Team Sport

Elite junior hockey players sweat at roughly 1.8 liters per hour during a hard on-ice practice—a rate that rivals or exceeds what many outdoor endurance athletes lose in summer heat, even though the building is held near 14 °C. The cold air is exactly why the fluid loss goes unnoticed: nothing about standing on ice in a chilled arena feels like a hydration problem, so the drinking rarely keeps up with the sweating.

What the Sweat-Rate Research Actually Found

A 2008 study in Applied Physiology, Nutrition, and Metabolism measured 44 candidates for Canada's national junior men's team across four intense one-hour practices, in arena conditions of about 13.9 °C and 66 percent relative humidity. The average on-ice sweat rate was 1.8 liters per hour. Players drank during practice—but only enough to replace about 58 percent of what they lost. Average body-mass loss landed at 0.8 percent, and roughly a third of the players lost more than 1 percent of their body weight in a single skate.

The same study found that more than half the players arrived at practice already mildly hypohydrated, before a single shift. Sweat sodium concentration averaged 54.2 mmol/L, with total sodium losses around 2.26 grams per practice.

Why Cold Air Hides the Fluid Loss

Three things stack up at a rink. Full hockey gear is heavy, insulating, and nearly non-breathable, so the heat a player generates during a shift has almost nowhere to go—the cold air outside the equipment does very little for the microclimate inside it. Second, cold, dry arena air evaporates sweat quickly and adds respiratory water loss with every hard breath, so a player never looks as drenched as the numbers say they are. Third, the thirst signal itself is blunted in cold environments, which means the usual internal cue to drink shows up late, if at all.

Put together, a hockey player can finish a practice down a liter of fluid without ever having felt thirsty or noticeably hot.

Why a Deficit That Size Matters on the Ice

The American College of Sports Medicine's fluid-replacement position stand identifies roughly 2 percent of body mass as the point where dehydration begins to measurably degrade performance. Most of the players in the hockey study stayed under that line on average—but a third crossed 1 percent in one practice, and practices stack. A player who starts the week mildly behind, loses a liter a session, and replaces a bit more than half of it is trending in one direction across a heavy stretch of the schedule. For a sport built on repeated maximal sprints and quick decision-making, that trend is worth managing before it becomes noticeable.

Building the Habit Around the Bench

Hockey has an unusually convenient structure for drinking: shifts are short, bench time between them is frequent, and there are two long intermissions in a game. The practical problem is not opportunity, it is flow rate and gear. A player has maybe thirty to sixty seconds on the bench with gloves on and a cage in the way, which is why a lid that delivers a fast, high-volume gulp beats one that requires a careful sip.

The routine that closes most of the gap looks like this: drink steadily through the day before a skate rather than only at the rink, bring more fluid than feels necessary, treat every bench sequence and every intermission as a scheduled drink rather than an optional one, and finish whatever is left after the session instead of carrying a full bottle home. Because a cold rink suppresses the thirst cue, the drinking has to run on a schedule rather than on feel.

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This post is for informational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. Consult a coach, athletic trainer, or healthcare professional for guidance specific to your training needs.

Sources: Palmer MS, Spriet LL. Sweat rate, salt loss, and fluid intake during an intense on-ice practice in elite Canadian male junior hockey players. Appl Physiol Nutr Metab. 2008;33(2):263–271 (PMID 18347681) • American College of Sports Medicine, Exercise and Fluid Replacement position stand (2% body-mass threshold) • NuRich product specifications