Picking your Sports Drink

Article by Cynthia Xu, Accedited Practising Dietitian

You’ve seen the TV adverts. It starts with an average Joe and ends with a gladiator tearing up the playing field. Sports drinks and sports waters are formulated to boost you performance but it can be hard to know what’s best.

Sports drinks, such as Gatorade^TM, Powerade^TM or Lucozade Sport^TM to name the main ones, are designed to provide both carbohydrate and fluids in the concentrations that allow them to be emptied quickly from the stomach and absorbed into the body. The term ‘isotonic’ is often used, which means the drink has similar concentrations of carbohydrate and electrolytes as in the human body.

Also on the market are sports waters, such as Mizone^TM, that are hypotonic (having lower concentrations of salt and sugar compared to the human body). They have a lower carbohydrate and electrolyte content compared with sports drinks and are much lighter in flavour.

When should sports drinks be used?

All sports can benefit from the carbohydrates provided by sports drinks, but the extent to which your performance improves will depend on the type of sport, your current nutrition plan and the duration of activity.

Realistically speaking, you should start consuming the sports drinks at least 1 hour before exercise begins – in particular for events that are expected to be more than 60 minutes of intermittent high intensity activity (such as team sports), more than 90 minutes of moderate intensity activity (such as distance running) or events that drag out across a long day (such as gymnastics carnival days or when competing in multiple athletic events).

Drinking before you start allow for muscle glycogen to be topped up and for rehydration to occur.  Drinking regular mouthfuls throughout exercise enable consistent fluid and energy delivery, as well as replace electrolytes lost in sweat. Drinking during recovery of course serves the same purpose of glycogen restoration and rehydration.

Sports drinks can be an easy way to deliver carbohydrates if you simply cannot tolerate eating carbohydrate foods. This can be because of the large amount of food required in the carbohydrate loading period before long endurance events, or because your nervous stomach is flip-flopping on competition day.

What about sports waters?

As they are not as high in carbohydrate and electrolytes as sports drinks, they may not be as suitable for longer events. However, as they contain carbohydrates, they are a better option compared with water for those who cannot tolerate the strong flavours or dry mouth discomfort associated with drinking sports drinks. There is some research to show that their performance enhancing effects for shorter events can be comparable to that of traditional sports drinks.

A final word on energy drinks, soft drinks, cordial and juice.

These are all very high in carbohydrates, which mean they are not emptied from the stomach at a good rate for optimal absorption. More than energy, the carbonation in energy drinks and soft drinks actually limit how much fluid you can drink (increasing dehydration risk) and cause more discomfort due to bloating. So obviously, the benefits of their caffeine content are far outweighed by the performance compromise associated with dehydration.