University Of Florida Researcher Who Invented Gatorade Dies At 80

Main Category: Sports Medicine / Fitness
Article Date: 10 Dec 2007 - 2:00 PDT

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On a sadder note for the University of Florida, J. Robert Cade, the UF researcher who invented the sports drink Gatorade and launched a multibillion-dollar industry that helped turn the school into a tech transfer powerhouse, died last week of kidney failure. He was 80. Cade and his colleagues created the sports drink in 1965 to help the school's football players replace carbohydrates and electrolytes lost through sweat while playing in swamp-like heat.

His death prompted reminiscences of what has become a legend in tech transfer circles. Now sold in 80 countries in dozens of flavors, Gatorade was born thanks to a question from former Gators Coach Dwayne Douglas, Cade said in a 2005 interview. He asked, "Doctor, why don't football players wee-wee after a game?" The question "changed our lives," Cade said. He and his research team went on to find that a football player could lose as much as 18 pounds -- most of it water -- during a game, and that they sweated away sodium and chloride and lost plasma volume and blood volume.

Using their research, and about $43 in supplies, they concocted a brew for players to drink while playing football. The first batch was not exactly a hit. "It sort of tasted like toilet bowl cleaner," said Dana Shires, one of the researchers. "I guzzled it and I vomited," Cade said. The researchers added some sugar and some lemon juice to improve the taste. It was first tested on freshmen because Coach Ray Graves didn't want to hurt the varsity team.

Eventually, however, the use of the sports beverage spread to the Gators, who enjoyed a winning record and were known as a "second-half team" by outlasting opponents. After the Gators beat Georgia Tech 27-12 in the Orange Bowl in 1967, Tech coach Bobby Dodd told reporters his team lost because "we didn't have Gatorade." PepsiCo Inc. now owns the brand, which has brought the university more than $150 million in royalties since 1973. Cade said he thought the use of Gatorade would be limited to sports teams and never dreamed it would be purchased by regular consumers. "I never thought about the commercial market," he said. "The financial success of this stuff really surprised us."

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