Survival of the Fittest

Oftentimes, by the time the media gets a hold of a message, it gets blown out of proportion. OK, we blow it out of proportion. In this case, the message, “Chocolate milk is a good postworkout recovery drink,” morphed — at least in my mind — to “Chocolate milk is an ideal postworkout recovery drink.” (Probably because I really, really wanted it to be true.)

So I had a few questions after reading this June 3 post by Adam Russell, PhD, high-performance nutrition and supplementation consultant to USA Rugby, in which he poked fun at the recent New York Times article on post-workout nutrition. I was especially baffled since chocolate milk had been second on Russell’s May 28 list of suggested postworkout amino acids. As in, is this dude moody?

But no. He just wanted to clarify that chocolate milk is “good, but not perfect.” Which he elaborated upon in a third post the other day, as well as in an email to me.

Here’s what Russell has to say about why chocolate milk isn’t an ideal postworkout recovery drink:

• The major protein in milk, casein, is a slow-digesting protein, which means the gastric emptying time of chocolate milk isn’t as good as some other possibilities. And the faster you can get amino acids out of the small intestine and into the bloodstream during the recovery phase, the better it is for insulin response and protein synthesis.

• The types of carbs in milk aren’t as fast-delivering as some other sources; namely, the ones in Surge and Vitargo.

• There’s potential for lactose intolerance in a significant portion of the population.

• Many commercial milks are sweetened using poor-quality sugars (and in the case of high-fructose corn syrup [HFCS], downright dangerous). Folks who work out really hard can get away with HFCS on occasion, but we’re talking high-intensity interval and strength and conditioning training. Given that some folks think of walking up a flight of stairs is a workout, adding more cheap sugars to their diets could be a very, very bad thing for most of America.

So what does the job better than chocolate milk?

Surge and Vitargo are two examples. And adding whey protein isolate to the latter may be better yet.

But chocolate milk is still a decent option, right?

Yes. It does the job better than most crap out there, it’s cheaper (although milk isn’t as cheap as it used to be) and you don’t have to think very hard about it. So pay your taxes, be nice, and at the very least drink chocolate milk after a moderate- to high-intensity workout.

[photo by russeljsmith]

(Photo credit: Samantha Hawkins)

As I was paging through a women’s fitness magazine the other day, I came across an article offering a plan to melt 10 pounds of fat from my frame in a month. I felt a frisson of annoyance. Don’t get me wrong — I think it’s crucial to maintain a healthy weight for your general well-being, not to mention your energy level and day-to-day functional capabilities — but the topic of weight loss with the end goal of zipping into your skinny jeans is so ubiquitous that the very thought of it makes me want to bare my teeth.

Sure, I want to look svelte, but I also want to do something with my strength. And I don’t see fitness information presented from that perspective nearly often enough. (A pointless aside: I couldn’t settle on whether to use the somewhat lifeless word “information” in the previous sentence, but when I searched for synonyms in an online thesaurus, “hot poop” was suggested. I stuck with “information.”)

Although the content of men’s mags tends to be closer to what I’m looking for in terms of training perspectives, it mainly caters to — duh — men. And there, still, the angle is often geared toward aesthetics. Meaning, I don’t always want to wade through articles on building size to get to the stuff that interests me more.

While losing weight and gaining muscle mass are both extremely worthy fitness goals in their own right, I often feel like I have to choose between being a matchstick or a meathead, and neither category suits me particularly well. I find myself wishing for more information with a practical, performance-oriented bent.

Sure, there are Web sites populated with articles written by those with advanced fitness degrees, but sometimes the lingo is as advanced as the degrees, and I’m left with less workable knowledge of a concept than I’d prefer.

I do my best to deliver interesting, practical fitness content in my domain of the print version of Experience Life — namely, in Form & Function, Fitness Fixes, Full Speed and the fitness features — but my responsibility to our readership as a whole means some topics are outside the scope of what’s important to enough people.

I realize I’m starting to sound like Goldilocks: “This one is too hot, this one is too cold …”

So. When my editor in chief asked each of the Experience Life editors to start our own blog on this spankin’-new Web site, I figured this might be a way for me to compile the right — “just right,” if you will — mix of fitness data for me, and for any other fitness Goldilocks out there.

To that end, part of the territory I’ll cover here is fitness for sports, from an athlete’s perspective — and I use the term “athlete” to encompass everyone from members of an adult soccer league to those who get paid to play.

I’ll also be seeking answers to the most critical of questions. Such as, is it true that chocolate milk is a viable recovery drink? And if so, can anyone else hear those angels singing? (There’s good — no, great — news for choco-milk lovers on that front.)

Before we commence, I want to be clear about something: I don’t have a degree in kinesiology or nutrition; just a degree in professional editing. Nor am I a personal trainer, although I’m toying with the idea of getting certified.

What I am is a fitness journalist and a lifelong athlete who has followed some of the most challenging fitness programs around, and asked a whole lot of questions along the way.

Far better, wielding my title of fitness editor, I have access to some of the most knowledgeable fitness experts around the world.

I’m looking forward to sharing said experts’ opinions (plus my own experiences and lessons learned the hard way) about how to get faster, stronger and more agile. About how to avoid and treat the most common sports injuries. About the fitness lore we’re not sure whether or not to believe.

Along the way, I’ll probably also try a few silly fitness fads, test out some gear and explore whatever other ideas this blog generates.

Every couple weeks, I’ll check in here and talk to you. Offer up relevant topic suggestions, and I’ll do my best to cover them, here or within the pages of Experience Life. Or, feel free to submit ideas to me at jsinkler@experiencelifemag.com.