S1:E2 – How It All Started
Show Notes:
James Mayo:
Welcome back to episode two. I’m James, I’m the Chief Hydration Officer, and today you’ve got me all by my lonesome where I discuss my life in the military [and] my life in running. I loved serving. To all of those that have served, thanks very much for you service, and to those that are still serving, thank you for your continued service. And as an athlete, I loved running. I actually stay active today. I decided to take up the crazy world of triathlon to keep me fresh—well, not so fresh afterwards! I want to discuss how that’s helped me reach my goal of helping people live strong, healthy lives through better hydration.
The most important lesson I’ve learned through military life about being healthy and growing a business is: there’s no such thing as “you can’t”. It may not be the end goal you wanted, but it’ll be further along from where you started. I’m trying to teach my eldest daughter about the joys of losing and the fact that you just have to keep trying. There’s that phrase, “try, try, try again if at first you don’t succeed.” I’d like to edit that to say “if at first you don’t succeed, analyze, re-look at it, try, analyze, re-look at it, try again” because if you just keep trying the same old thing, you are going to fail most likely. You have to adapt, improvise, and overcome.
Helping people stay hydrated and healthy has always been something I’m keen about—especially since we started SOS. So, what does SOS do and why is that great in terms of keeping you healthy and hydrated? Just imagine, if you’re just feeling thirsty, you’re 2% dehydrated. That can lead to a 25% loss in our performance. By providing a range of electrolyte, vitamin and mineral solutions in the form of a ready-to-drink or in powder form, SOS gives you a perfect balance of electrolytes, vitamins, and minerals to speed water into your cells as fast as possible.
People often wonder how and why we created SOS and if it would help athletes in the military in today’s world. Well, I was just like you—I got dehydrated. I would run; I’d be dehydrated. I served; I was dehydrated. My troops were dehydrated. In fact, I think dehydration is one of the number one non-combat casualty problems in the military today and the fact that the troops are getting to the front line and their dehydrated means they’re not going to perform at their peak. The problem is that unfortunately a lot of scientists on the military and the civilian side think that sugar is an electrolyte and that you need lots of sugar to be partnered with electrolytes to help keep you all hydrated and happy. Well, it’s not true. You just need electrolytes, water, and a little bit of sugar but not so much. Sugar acts as a bridge into your cells, and the salt, water, and other additions will follow it. Don’t get me wrong, sugar is an energy and a fuel form, and it’s essential for keeping us going. On my triathlon bike I still take my gels, but I take [them] separate from my hydration because my hydration is its own special elixir that basically transports the water and electrolytes into [my] cells. Electrolytes added to the water create that magical sparkle.
I moved a lot as a kid. My father was in the military. When I joined the army, I moved again. I thought, “when I leave the army, I’m done, I’m not moving anymore”. Twenty-nine moves later, I kept moving. That’s something I didn’t expect. I love it, but maybe one day I’ll stop moving on every couple of years. That said, getting to experience different parts of the world from Hong Kong, Singapore, South Africa, Jordan, Canada, now here in America [has shown me] there’s all sorts of wonderful places.
The top “aha” moment from the SOS product creation and journey [is] the moment in the winery where Dr. Blanca, Tom and myself got ourselves into a position that was like “why didn’t we do this [earlier]?” Tom crashed and burned at a world championship with dehydration. I had suffered dehydration. Blanca, my wife, who is a board-certified gastroenterologist, treats patients with electrolytes and then ends up with the excess sugar from other drinks, causing other problems, so it was like “we need a better for you solution”. And the second “aha” moment was after we’d had kids where trapsing down the lines in the supermarket, I needed better for you kids’ juices. There wasn’t anything. It was sugar. Hundreds of calories in a drink for a kid, and I get the sugar rush but afterwards there’s a sugar low. The second “aha” moment was creating SOS kids, and that’s been a lot of fun.
The most important lesson I’ve learned about proper hydration for everyday living is [that] you just feel better. You’re less grouchy, you’re more energetic, you just feel on top of your game.
The military life and being a runner have inspired and helped me discover SOS because I got prediabetic from all the junk I consumed. I [hope] that no one else [has] to go through that. I was fortunate—I managed my diet, I took up triathlons and got myself sorted. In short, and SOS a day keeps the doctor away for me and hopefully it does that for you.
The one thing that SOS has done for our customers that I didn’t expect [is] to [be able to] help recovery from colds and flu and even COVID, which all dehydrate because of the fever. We’ve had so many different people, myself included, feeling so much better. Hydration is something you neglect when you’re feeling terrible and the more you can get on top of your hydration, the better you feel. There have been lots of cases of people getting sick recently and the fever is a bad thing, so recovering from that is one thing I didn’t really expect. The other one on a side note is [that] it’s pretty good for hangovers. I was hoping that after the day in the winery we’d have had it then.
My favorite hydration hack for the military, athletes, hardworking parents and business owners out there is take an SOS before you go to bed if you’ve had a couple [of drinks], and I always take an SOS in the morning because it gets me ahead of my day, I prehydrate, I feel a lot better. The final one is [that] I always carry a couple of sticks in the car because you never know where you’ll be traveling.
For more healthy hydration tips, visit my website chiefhydrationofficer.com. Again, I’m James, thanks so much for listening. Be sure to grab the show notes at chiefhydrationofficer.com and for everything that was mentioned in this episode. Feel free to subscribe to the podcast and meet us back here for the next episode to discuss…Goodfellas – the life of a family business with my brother and to see where it’s led to today. Thanks so much for listening, happy hydrating, and cheers!
