An estimation based on a formula to know how much water should we drink in a day during summer time, in order to keep hydrated and help our body function properly.

Water is beyond any doubt the most important resource we all need daily. As I could see in different wilderness survival shows on TV, the utmost priority of those who are brave and mad enough to participate in such tough challenges is to find a reliable source of water. They know that they could hang on without eating for days, but if they had no available water at their disposal their adventures would certainly end in no more than a couple of days.

However, we don't necessarily have to get out in the wild and frantically search for a spring of any other water source to realize how crucial water is to our lives, it's enough to spend a few hours on a hot summer day in the concrete jungle of our cities to realize how badly we need water every day. Staying hydrated is of utmost importance to keep our bodies in a good condition especially when we have to get out and face the summer heat, but how much water is enough to allow us to get past such difficult moments?

How much water to drink on a hot summer day?

Well, there is a formula I found on the web which takes into account a couple of factors such as the age and the weight of each individual that can offer us an estimation of how much water should we drink daily.  Therefore, this is how the ideal quantity of water, represented by the number of cups we are supposed to drink every day, is calculated:

1. Divide your weight, calculated in pounds, by 2.2 
2. Multiply the number you got by your age.
3. Divide that number by 28.3, and thus you will find out the total number of ounces of water you need to drink.
4. Divide that number by 8 and the number of cups of water you need to drink daily will be revealed.

Following this procedure took me a little more time than I had expected because I'm not used to the UK metric system, so I had to make some conversions, first from kilograms to pounds and then from ounces to liters, but eventually I got  my result, so I discovered that I am supposed to drink about 148 ounces of water a day on a given summer day, which is converted into 18 cups or, to be more exact since I couldn't find out the exact required dimensions of a cup, 4.2 liters of water a day!

That is quite a number, certainly more than I had expected, considering the fact that I always hear in the mass media that we should drink at least 2 liters of water per day, but I don't assume this is an exaggerated number. I think that 'water' refers to any type of liquid that can help us get hydrated, such as the one from soups, cups of tea, maybe coffee (but definitely not alcoholic drinks, which are not recommended at all during hot days ), so in this context 4.2 liters of liquids per day sounds quite reasonable to me.

So that is the quantity of water I am supposed to drink when it's hot outside, and it is a recommendation I am about to follow at least during the summer months. It may seem a little more than I had anticipated, but better hydrated than sorry! Summer can be a truly great season if we take a few measures to protect our health, but it can also turn into a nightmare if we ignore them, and drinking plenty of water is  one of they key factors which make the difference between a lovely summer and an awful one!

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