Whenever I drink during a run I get a stitch

I'm in line with my Hal Higdon novice 1 plan but have a slight concern.

Now my lsr's are longer (half marathon this weekend) I'm more concious that I need to be drinking water to hydrate my body but every time I drink water I get a stitch which takes a few minutes to walk off.

I've tried taking really small sips but that doesn't work either.

I'm tempted to just run without any water but that could be a terrible mistake?

Any advice would be appreciated.

Sorry not very helpful but you are not going to be able to run 26.2 without taking on liquid so you are going to have to keep trying and find out what works for you. There was a thread a week or so ago with lots of helpful suggestions about stitch but nothing conclusive.

On rare occasions I have had it I find pressing hand hard into pain area and carrying on running helps. Others swear by breathing techniques, running bent over for a bit, breath as you hit the ground etc

Are you stopping to drink?  I used to try that drinking on the move malarkey and never got on with it. 

Another thing to watch is the amount you drink at a time.  You can deal with a couple of sips when running (repeating as often as necessary) but it you try to have 250ml in one go, this will cause trouble.

Sorry, just realised you mention small sips, so ignore my post.

Thanks for the replies.

I wasn't stopping while I was drinking and that was actually the next thing I was going to try to see if that helped.

I just find it impossible to run the stitch off and have to walk for a short while.

Is there a recommendation for how much water/how often I should drink on a run?

I've no doubt there are precise calculations for it somewhere, although with temperature & wind variations it may be quite complex. I prefer the 'drink to thirst' strategy. Seems to work very well (and has a sound theory behind it too).

Where is the stich? I got told once that a stich is a muscle spasm and that by taking in big deep breaths you expand your chest cavity stretching the muscle and therefore stopping the spasm. That may be wrong but when I get a stitch this method seems to help. As for drinking, at smaller races out of a plactic cup it find it impossible to run and drink it usually goes all over my face. At larger races where bottles are given out its easier to sip from them. If my memory serve me right back in 08 and 09 they had water bottles and lucozade with sports tops. It may have changed now.

Last year the water and lucozade had sports tops I think.