Finally, I Can More Accurately Develop My Fluid Intake OCD

I drink a lot of coffee (a lot). I, also, from time-to-time imbibe in the heavenly brew of beer. Now, maybe it is from playing high school sports where coaches adamantly reinforce the notion that allowing yourself to dehydrate is a cardinal sin punishable by extra calisthenics (if that makes sense) or maybe it is just another form of my OCD leaking through, but I absolutely have to stay hydrated. Caffeine and alcohol are both diuretics, so I knew I needed to increase my water consumption to compensate, but I never had an algorithm to use. I had to just "play it by ear."

Well, if you suspend your disbelief of the Internet doling out less-than-accurate statistics and take at face value what two Internet sites have to say, I now have an actual calculation I can perform.

Here's what I am looking at:

Rehydration

one cup of coffee will cause you to lose 1-1/4 cups of fluid

THE ATHLETE’S KITCHEN

One study showed that athletes who drank beer eliminated about 16 ounces more urine (over the course of 4 hours)

Couple those two statistics with the rule of thumb that you should drink about two liters of water per day (which varies depending on your level of activity), I can calculate how much water to drink. (I need to assume, in the case of the athletes, that they were drinking at the rate of 1 beer per hour, thus one loses 4 ounces of fluid for every 12 ounces of beer). (Also, note that 2 liters is about 68 ounces.)

f(water) = -68 - (ounces_of_coffee * 1.25) - (ounces_of_beer * 0.33)

So, if I consume 24oz of coffee and 36oz of beer in a day, I would need to have drank 110oz of water to remain in equilibrium.

J$

*UPDATE*: Fixed screwy number per Sparky's eagle eye.