Chocolate milk the not-so new Sports Drink
Every athlete, despite their level, is looking for an edge, a little help, something to train and/or perform better. Hence the tremendous sum of money being spent on performance products and supplements. In these trying economic times, I have a little secret for you...chocolate milk.
Yep you heard it right...chocolate milk. The funny thing is that this is not new information but I guess brown moo is not exotic or sexy enough to pique the interest of serious athletes... too bad because in several studies cheap ol' chocolate milk smoked some very well known sports drinks.
I'll paraphrase one of the studies for you. At the Indiana University kinesiology/physiology lab, high-level cyclist trained to exhaustion (depleting glycogen stores). Then within 45-minutes, they drank 20 oz. of chocolate milk. The cyclist rested for 4-hours. They then pedaled to exhaustion. With the chocolate milk, they pedaled 49% longer and had a 57% increase in their work output as compared to the results after consuming a very popular carbohydrate sports drink (gator-something or other). A similar study with similar results has been performed with swimmers and strength (weight lifting) athletes.
Milk is 90% water so it hydrates well. The 4 to 1 carbohydrate:protein ratio seems to be perfectly balanced for athletes. The carbs replenish energy and the protein rebuilds muscle. The extra sugar in chocolate milk also helps. As we all know milk is a great source of vitamins and minerals that are important in proper growth and development. Babies drink it for a reason.
Timing is very important. The milk needs to be consumed within 1 hour after the work out to maximize its potential benefits.
If you don't believe in scientific studies and think that I would mislead you, maybe you'll believe Dara Torres. You remember Dara, the 40-something (years old) Olympic gold-medalist swimmer from Beijing. That's right. She's the one with the chocolate, low-fat, got milk 'stache that beat all of those girls half her age.
I read your articles everytime I see them on mmajunkie.com. This was a very informative article, but I have one question. Are you including protein powder and ready to drink protein in this study? On the label on my current protein supplement it reads "Protein matrix" and gives no explanation of it at all. I guess I am confused because just about everything I read says you should have a good protein supplement. Please clear this up for me.. thanks!
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