Must attend:

• Hong Kong Sevens Tournament (rugby) – there are loads of rugby 7s tournaments, this is the original headline event.
• State of Origin series (Australian rugby league)
• A Superbowl (American football)
• An All-Ireland GAA football final with Dublin beating Kerry, Meath, Cork, or Tyrone.  Actually, make that 4 All-Ireland finals (with Dublin …)
• Tour de France Alpe D’Huez stage finish

Would like to attend:

• Heineken Cup final (rugby), preferably with an Irish team, preferably not Munster again (I don’t mind Munster, it’s just the bloody fans that are annoying).
• Rugby World Cup final
• Snooker World Championship match at The Crucible
• The Ashes (cricket)
• CFB Bowl game (American college football)
• MLB World Series Game 7
• NBA Championship Game 7

What about you, sports fans, what sports events must you attend before you meet your maker? Post a comment and let me know!

Updates from Twitter (I’m @AMcDermott):

@TheMenace said: @AMcDermott Ireland vs England 6 Nations at Croke Park. Although I think you’ve only got 1 more chance to do that :D

@interactivemark said: @AMcDermott Stanley Cup game 7 (preferably w/ NY Rangers) any Olympic event (preferably ice hockey) and the running of the bulls.

If you don’t want the bother of making your own, this powdered drink seems pretty popular online.

The important ingredients of a sports drink are:

• water keep the body hydrated,
• salts to both
  • aid in that hydration (salt makes the solution isotonic) and to
  • replace some (but not all) of the lost salts from sweat, and
• carbohydrates (sugars) for energy.

It’s pretty easy to figure out a simple recipe if you want to make your own sports drink. Mess with the amounts to make it taste ok but don’t over do the sugar or salt:

• 70% water
• 30% orange juice
• small amount of sugar to your energy and taste needs
• pinch of salt (sodium is good, great if you can get some with potassium also)

That’s it. Simple, eh? Covers the basics, is dead cheap and tastes just fine. So that’s a bit basic, what else can you make?

One I’ve heard of cyclists using a lot years ago is flat coke, they shake it up to remove the gas which can interfere with digestion. I don’t know if they add salt but would make sense. This explains why a lot of pro-cyclists have bad teeth :)

Here’s another DIY energy drink recipe which I saw over at Yaniverse – (s)he calls “EnerT”. The ingredients for 1000ml:

• 2 Tea Bags
• 6 level teaspoon sugar (24 grams)
• A pinch of salt (0.5 grams)
• 2 oz lemon juice (about 55 grams)
• 30 oz boiling water

I opted for tea as caffeine has a beneficial workout benefit, and tea provides a low-level caffeine, striking my personally preferred balanced between ‘waking’ and ‘wired’. Any level of sugars under 8% is acceptable, but I find Gatorade to be overly caloric for those of us trying to balance increased workout performance with weight loss/maintenance.

Good point on the caffeine, and the sugar content is interesting too, I didn’t realise Gatorade was so high in calories.

An alternative if you don’t want to make your own is powdered Ola loa sports drink.

Further reading:

• Yaniverse EnerT recipe
• Messenger of Doom’s recipe
• Wikipedia – Sports drink
• Wikipedia – Isotonic
• Wikipedia – Electrolyte
• Wikipedia – Water intoxication
• Wikipedia – Energy drink