Val Hannahs

·46 min·2 clips

Hannes gives a game-day template: "three to four hours out" for a performance plate and "30 grams of carbohydrates" near puck drop.

Val Hannes joins the Hockey IQ Podcast for a conversation about sports dietetics and hockey performance. It opens with her Columbus background, her years in volleyball and softball, and the way an early curiosity about nutrition grew out of playing sports and paying attention to how her body felt. That personal starting point gives the episode a grounded, easy entry. From there, the conversation shifts into the day-to-day work of helping athletes fuel and recover in a way that fits their training load. Hydration becomes the main thread. Hannes explains why water alone is not enough in hockey and why electrolytes matter when sweat losses add up. She walks through sweat-rate testing and the value of knowing what an individual athlete actually loses. The approach is simple enough to use: measure loss, then estimate what needs to be replaced after practice or a game. The episode keeps circling back to specificity. Hannes stresses that the goal is not just more fluid, but the right mix of fluid and electrolytes. She also notes that too much of one piece can be a problem when the rest of the plan is off. The conversation broadens to include food as part of hydration. Fruits and vegetables can contribute a lot of water, so the full day’s intake has to be considered, not only what is in the bottle at the rink. That wider view keeps the advice practical. Hannes frames nutrition as something that has to be individualized around sweat rate, training load, and what an athlete is already eating. Recovery stays in focus throughout. The discussion returns to the idea that if a player starts already dehydrated, the next session begins from a deficit that is harder to erase later. The tone stays measured and collegial. Instead of treating hydration like a slogan, the episode turns it into checks, adjustments, and real decisions for teams and individual athletes. The result is a calm, useful conversation about how small choices in fluid and electrolytes can shape comfort, performance, and recovery across a season.

As heard by us

A practical hockey nutrition talk that treats hydration as part of performance prep.

The episode stays grounded in the practical side of hockey nutrition: hydration, electrolytes, sweat rate testing, and replacing what is lost so recovery starts from a better place.

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Why you'd press play

You want a clearer answer on hydration for hockey, with the basics explained by a sports dietitian.

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