Many companies and even entire industries can be traced back to a question—but they’re usually not as odd as this one. In 1965, Dwayne Douglas, a football coach at the University of Florida, wondered, Why aren’t the players urinating more after the games? The coach was baffled because he knew his players were drinking water on the sidelines; what he didn’t realize was that they were sweating away more fluids than could be replaced with water. Douglas shared his question with J. Robert Cade, a professor of renal (kidney) medicine at the university—who set about formulating a drink that could replace the electrolytes lost through sweat. Cade’s mixture was first tested on the freshman football team—who proceeded to defeat the upperclassmen in a practice session. The drink became known as Gatorade (named after the team mascot) and helped launch a sports drink industry now worth almost $20 billion.
