Lately I have been stumbling across a lot of news stories about sugar in sports drinks, comparing them to soda, and calling them junkfood. People making these comparisons don’t seem to realize that sports drinks serve a specific purpose. They are designed to enhance exercise performance and increase endurance. Research has clearly shown that hydration and performance are improved from drinking carbohydrate (sugar) containing drinks versus plain water during exercise.
Many people take an all or nothing approach to eating. In moderation most foods/drinks are fine, however drinking soda (or sports drinks) with very little exercise is obviously unhealthy. Same with saturated fats- most people think saturated fat is unhealthy. It’s not unhealthy in small amounts, but causes a myriad of health problems in large amounts. High fructose corn syrup (glucose+fructose) is also considered “bad.” It’s not that high fructose corn syrup is inherently unhealthy it’s that the average person consumes 60 pounds of it a year!
Maltodextrin, sucrose and fructose are the main ingredients in most sports drinks. There is a lot of confusion regarding the types and amounts of sugars used in sports drinks and whether or not they are healthy.
Anti-sugar campaigns claim many things but mainly that certain sugars cause an energy spike followed by a crash therefore affecting performance negatively. According to this some people claim that slow acting sugars and non sugar carbohydrates are better. The human body is not capable of absorbing carbohydrates as quickly as carbohydrates are oxidized in the muscle during moderate exercise. So to get the maximum benefit from consuming carbs during exercise it is best to consume the most rapidly absorbed and metabolized carbs. There is not an advantage to consuming carbs that take a long time to get to the muscles.
Some complex carbohydrates such as maltodextrin perform just as well as simple sugars such as fructose, glucose and sucrose. Maltodextrin is metabolized just as quickly as simple sugars and is great for sports drinks because it isn’t sweet, allows rapid stomach emptying, and is absorbed quickly. Fructose is normally included in sports drinks because it is metabolized in a slightly different way than other sugars. When carbohydrates are consumed in amounts large enough to saturate the body’s capacity, it will still be able to metabolize a small amount of fructose. However fructose should not be consumed in large amounts because it will upset the stomach.
Any food that is not eaten in moderation can be considered “junk food.” Sports drinks are not junk food when they are used for what they are intended, to hydrate and to improve performance during exercise.
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