Skratch Labs Hydration Powder | Sport Drink Mix | Electrolytes Powder for Exercise, Endurance, and Performance | Lemon + Lime | 60 Servings | Non-GMO, Vegan, Kosher

*THE BEST OF THE BEST FOR HYDRATION POWDER MIXES*
I have been on a year long adventure to find a hydration powder mix that best suits me. SKRATCH LABS IS THE ONE I HAVE SETTLED ON!I particularly like the pineapple & cucumber lime. If you are looking for something with a strong flavor, then this may not be the option for you.For me personally, it’s a perfectly balanced taste with the HUGE BONUS of no aftertaste at all, whatsoever. As far as it mixing, not a problem at all! I use it in both a well insulated thermas, and a larger bottled water that I reuse for this purpose.*note that Core water is one great example because it’s a strong, sturdy bottle with a tight fitted lid*If sediment begins to settle just simply shake the bottle. When using in a glass I mix with a small, handheld mixer/frother that I grabbed on Amazon (Sale price $10).10/10 recommend!

Perfect balance
Scratch Labs is now my go-to electrolyte. It has bo artificial sweeteners and still tastes great (but not excessively sweet!) I’m very happy with how well it mixes up, and it comes with recommendations for half, full, and extra strength depending on what you need. It’s ideal for my long runs where I don’t want to be tasting my drink half a mile after taking a swig.

The best electrolyte and here’s why!
I found out the hard way that Exercise-Associated Hyponatremia is a real thing. If you sweat a lot when you work out and only replace your lost fluid with water and not sodium, you can end up with a nasty bout of EAH. I’ve occasionally consumed the big G electrolyte but was looking for something a step up. I avoid all artificial sweeteners including additives like monk fruit, stevia, etc. There’s not a lot out that that doesn’t use those ingredients but I researched and discovered Skratch!It’s a very fine powder that packs a subtle but detectable flavor. I add one scoop – 22 grams – to my 16 oz water bottle and put in the fridge (want it sweeter, use less water). When I work out, I’m able to sip the drink throughout the duration without getting that sloggy feeling in my stomach. I actually tolerate it better than water during intense workouts.I’ve tried three flavors and my favorites in order are Lemon-Lime (a distinct and pleasant flavor), Orange (nice, light, barely-there flavor) and Strawberry Lemonade (which I didn’t really care for at all… very little flavor and a little bitter to me).The amount of sodium and a few additional nutrients make this my one and only go-to sports drink now. It got me out of EAH territory quickly (a few days) and I don’t go a day without it!

It’s basically what you would think a sports drink should be.
So I’m going to contextualize and preface the rest of this review by saying that when it comes to exercise, I’m pretty casual. I cycle when I can, and go to the gym for a relatively short while when the weather isn’t conducive to cycling. I’m not a professional cyclist or a bodybuilder or athlete; I exercise purely to keep in healthy shape and stave off the cardiac issues that run in my family, topping out around 400mi/month (sounds far, really isn’t).Sports drinks have never been a fondness of mine. On one end, you have drinks like C4, and indeed there is a use case, but not for people like me who are just out to keep fit. Then there’s “sports” drinks like Gatorade, which are sugary, expensive, and a little bit. . . useless. For a long time, I really didn’t use any additives in my water, but at one point I started searching for something that wouldn’t be obscenely sweet, and wouldn’t come with nasty side effects, but would just give me some extra sustaining power, and one person suggested Skratchlabs to me.Now, I could spend some time going over the menial details of the flavor, but let me just put it this way: it’s good. I like it. Your mileage may vary. It’s a light and refreshing lemon/lime flavor, and part of me has begun wondering if tossing in a bit of mint might actually not be an awful idea. When used as directed, it’s not offensively sweet as are drinks like Gatorade, and this falls directly in line with Skratchlabs’ Hydration mix’s purpose of being a hydration booster and endurance extender than an actual fuel. This is great, because it does two things: keeps the flavor palatable, and keeps the actual calorie content of the mixture down, allowing higher burn rates from other sources. Bottom line is that it’s a crisp, clean, flavor, and it’s not something that you’d get tired of drinking after a few sips.Actual effectiveness wise, I’d say endurance-wise, for the purposes of cycling, the actual endurance boost I get out of using this is highly variable, as there are just too many variables involved to try and quantify the effect in the scope of one dude casually cycling. I will say that, from a subjective standpoint, the difference is night and day. If I had to guess, on average, my range goes up at least 35% simply due to fatigue and muscle fatigue not setting in as fast. As a disclaimer, I would like to acknowledge the possibility that the Placebo effect plays a role here, but I have serious doubts that this could explain all of it.For the purposes of an indoor gym environment, wherein I have substantially more control over the variables at play, the data is a little more concrete. The difference was staggering. Normally, my routine consists of 10 minutes or so of stretching, 2km of rowing, 35 minutes on an exercise bike at a resistance level that roughly emulates cruising at 100RPM and 13-15mph, and then 5×5 of anything I can think of for my arms until I get too exhausted to continue. The difference here, was that I really *didn’t* get exhausted. What actually happened was that I could essentially continue until muscle fatigue set in and decreased performance. In endurance-type environments such as cycling, this was a little more subtle, but the number of reps I could push my arms to was visibly higher.Overall, 6 months of use later, I’m going to give this my seal of approval. My seal of approval is completely worthless, but I like this stuff, it works, and it’s exactly what I would want from a sports drink.

This is not too sweet, is easy to mix and is hydrating, in a quite natural way. My fourth order with Skratch.

I love the taste of this. It doesn’t taste salty to me and it is like an actual strawberry lemonade.