Gear Review: Nathan Qwickdraw Plus Water Bottle

I usually don’t address hydration on 5Ks because they are so fast and furious (relatively speaking from a midpack runner) that water is not needed.  For a 10K, I rely on water stations after the first 5K.  For other distances, I carry my trusty CamelBak Catalyst or my larger CamelBak FlashFlo.  Both of these are waist packs which I love for long distances.  The weight doesn’t bother me and they hold a ton of water, my fuel, my phone, my keys and emergency toilet paper (you never know!).

I was drawn to the waistpack style of hydration because I am very anti-handholding.  When my sister told me she ran with a water bottle I was bewildered.  Who wants to run with something in their hand?  I’ve been out hiking a few times and bought along my Iphone.  I don’t have an armband and carrying that thing in my hand was so annoying.

I live and run in Atlanta, GA.  There is a T-Shirt slogan that I spy on local runners all the time that neatly sums up the running landscape here from late-April to October – “Heat Hills & Humidity”.  The humidity and heat is creeping into even my early morning runs lately.  The days of cool Spring temps in the upper 50s are turning into muggy mid-60′s at 6AM.  Hydration becomes a huge issue as the temps creep up even on short runs.  I don’t worry about water during a 3-4 mile in the Fall/Winter but right now – water is very necessary.  I sweat a lot during normal weather and humidity exacerbates the situation – that water needs to be replenished.

Enter the Nathan QwickDraw Plus water bottle.  I love my CamelBak but filling the water bladder is a bit of a pain and wearing a waistpack feels like overkill for a 4 miler.  I wanted something smaller and easier to handle.  I had some REI dividend dollars begging to be spent so I scored the Nathan bottle for $8 out of pocket.

Imagine my shock when I discovered that carrying a “handheld” water bottle wasn’t the worst thing in the world!  I tested this bottle out on 2 4-milers and one 9-miler.  The bottle has an adjustable strap that wraps around your hand so that your fingers are only loosely gripping the bottle.  In fact, you can release your fingers and the bottle will stay put.  The QwickDraw Plus holds 22oz of water which is perfect for a shorter run.  I had to stop and refill it during my 9-miler.

At the beginning of my first run the with QwickDraw Plus, I was definitely thrown off by carrying something in my hand.  I wasn’t sure how to hold my arms and the arm with the bottle hung awkwardly.  I had only filled the bottle 1/2 full so there was some bothersome sloshing going on.  After a mile or so, I worked out a decent arm position.  I think carrying the bottle forced me to relax my shoulders and elbows more which is a good thing for my running form.  The sloshing ceased to annoy me since I run with music anyway.  I eventually forgot that I was wearing the thing (even when filled with 22oz of water) which amazed me.  The band over my hand was very comfortable and tightly gripping the bottle was not necessary.

The bottle has a bite top kind of spout.  You pull the bottle open with your teeth to drink and then push the spout back down.  I found the process of opening the spout easy but often needed several attempts to push the spout back down.  I wouldn’t realize that the spout was slightly open until I felt water droplets on my hand.  You have to push the spout down really hard which can be a little tough on the run.  You also need to close the bottle very tightly and make sure it is fully screwed down to avoid leaking.

A huge plus for handheld hydration is that having water at my fingertips reminded me to drink more often and allowed me to see how much water I had consumed.  As the weather warms and I put in more mileage this will become extremely important.  With my CamelBak, I sometimes postponed drinking because I didn’t feel like fumbling with the bite valve and tubing.  I also had no visual sense of how much water I was drinking since the water was stashed in a bag.

In addition to a water bottle, the QwickDraw has a little zippered pocket for keys, running fuel or a cellphone.  The “or” part of that sentence is important.  It is a very small pocket and I doubt you could get all three in there.  In practice, I think this would only hold a very small flip or skinny bar style cell phone and your key or one package of fuel.  I stashed my carkey fob and one packet of Sports Beans and I was pushing the limits of the pocket.  My Iphone would not fit in the pocket and neither would my old Samsung Rogue phone.  I tend to run phoneless so that wasn’t a problem for me.  I was very happy to be able to abandon my usual shoe wallet and securely stash my car key.  I am always so paranoid that my key will slip out of that thing!

What don’t I like?  Well your palm does surround the bottle so there is a heat/cold transference effect there.  If cold water is important to you, I wouldn’t expect it to remain too cool with the heat of your hand warming up the bottle.  On the flip side, when I refilled the bottle on my 9-miler the cold water chilled my hand.  I believe that Nathan makes a similar bottle that has thermal qualities to avoid these issues.

I also wish the pocket was a tad bigger.  Even though I could refill this bottle with water during the run, it is an imperfect solution for longer races.   I mentioned that my phone does not fit in the pocket and with my keys in-tow I could only carry one packet of fuel.  I’m sure they wanted to keep the bottle lightweight so I can see why this is the case.  Still, you’ll probably need a SPI belt (next on my “to-get” list) or something similar if you don’t travel lightly.

Overall, this is a great find for me during my short warm weather outdoor runs.  I’m very glad I decided to give a handheld water bottle a shot.  Even if you are a skeptic, give it a try.  The bottle retails for about $18 and can be found at certain sporting goods stores or purchased online.

Possibly unnecessary disclaimer: I paid for this bottle with my own money and a few hard-earned REI dividend dollars that I got for buying an insanely expensive jogging stroller last year.  Other products mentioned in this review were also purchased with my own funds. No potentially tainted review here!  Not that I would do that anyway if someone sent me something for free.  How do people get those hookups?!?