How to Make Speed Swill®

OCTOBER 2023

For centuries, one question has plagued humanity like a contagious bacterial disease characterized by fever and delirium (the black plague): Can you make your own electrolyte-rich sports drink?

The answer is yes, you can, and you don’t need to be a hotshot scientist working for Big Sports Beverage to figure it out. Electrolytes are just minerals, and your pantry is loaded with them. Potassium, magnesium, sodium, and calcium are just fancy names for ordinary things like salt, pepper, and baking soda, but Big Sports Beverage doesn’t want you to know that. Big Sports Beverage wants you to continue buying their products. In fact, I recommend you print this page immediately because Big Sports Beverage will definitely serve us with a cease and desist once they find out we’re blowing the lid on their delicious, refreshing, essential fluids-balancing scam. Here’s how to make your own Speed Swill®.

What You’ll Need

• 4 cups of water (preferably filtered)

• 1/2 teaspoon of table salt

• 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda

• 4 tablespoons of honey or maple syrup

• 2 tablespoons of lemon juice

• Food coloring (not absolutely necessary, but making this swill bright orange or pink or blue will definitely make it taste better)

• Natural food flavoring (again, not necessary, but why not? Make sure you choose a flavoring essence that works with lemon and honey. Like, don’t go with Marzipan or something dumb like that)

Instructions

1. Find ‘The Sorcerer’s Apprentice’ by French composer Paul Dukas on Spotify and turn it up to eleven.

2. In an old bucket or empty can of house paint (or glass pitcher), combine everything but the food coloring and food flavoring, making sure to stir until all elements have completely dissolved. Once everything has broken down in the solution, take a sip to determine whether it’s too salty, too sweet, not sweet enough, etc. Add extra ingredients as needed to balance the flavour out.

3. Now, this third step is a little more technical: getting your food coloring/flavoring ratios just right. Again, you don’t have to do this. You can drop anchor at step one and call it a day. But if you’re one of those people who like living on the edge, begin adding color and flavor in minuscule droplets until you get the perfect hue and taste. For the flavor, this will mean stirring in each incremental drop of essence, then taste testing with a rustic wooden spoon, looking thoughtful, and occasionally saying, ‘Hmmm.’ Getting the color right will involve holding the liquid up to the light and rubbing your chin while nodding.

4. Now that your Speed Swill® is ready, fill up the bottles on your hydration vest and hit the trail!

Disclaimer: This is a homemade sports nutrition beverage and we’re just eyeballing the electrolyte content because we are not hotshot scientists working for Big Sports Beverage. We don’t recommend setting out on a 50km run on the hottest day of summer with a few liters of Speed Swill®. Like, if you mix this up and then die in the desert, don’t blame us. We just make shorts and stuff. Also, Speed Swill® will not make you faster. If you want to go faster, you could probably add some caffeine, but we didn’t tell you that.