Cowboys Have a Wild Way to Track Player Hydration

The Dallas Cowboys are using some surprisingly high-tech urinals to help monitor players' hydration and determine when it's safer to practice indoors. With the Texas heat still hanging around in September, coach Brian Schottenheimer says the team's sports-science staff is helping decide when players should get outside and when they should stay under a roof.

According to NBCDFW, the Cowboys are trying to protect their players from the Texas heat. The Dallas Cowboys are taking hydration monitoring to a whole new level.

The team is using specialized urinals as part of its sports-science program to monitor players' hydration and sweat levels, with that information helping determine whether practice should be held indoors or outside. And yes, Cowboys head coach Brian Schottenheimer actually brought up the team's urinals when explaining the decision-making process.

How Science Is Helping Determine Where Dallas Practices

“We’ve got these cool urinals. I don’t know how much they cost, but they must have been expensive,” Schottenheimer said. He explained that the Cowboys are doing sweat testing and using the information collected by their sports-science staff to determine how the heat and humidity are affecting players

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Texas Heat Is Keeping the Cowboys Indoors

The Dallas area hasn't had measurable rainfall in nearly two months. Everyone in the Lone Star State is well aware of the fact that it's still very hot well into the month of September.

The Cowboys' indoor practice facility at The Star is actually a 12,000-seat stadium used for Frisco ISD high school football. The team's grass practice field is just a short walk away, but that doesn't mean the Cowboys are going to force themselves outside when the conditions aren't right.

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Cowboys Have a Long Season Ahead

The Texas heat can be brutal, and the Cowboys are doing what they can to protect their players which is the smart decision to make. Especially as they are just getting started with a long season ahead with many believeing they have a real shot at making a run into the playoffs with hopes of this year making it back to the Super Bowl.

The Cowboys haven't been back to the Super Bowl since the 1995 season, so there are plenty of fans hoping all of this preparation eventually helps Dallas make a serious postseason run.