EDMONTON – No one has died from dehydration while exercising. On the other hand, 16 people have died from over-hydration while working out. Yet sports companies tell us you need to drink before you feel thirsty when you exercise.
Don’t believe it, says Peter Gill, a University of Alberta medical student and a Rhodes Scholar completing his PhD in primary care at the University of Oxford in the U.K.
Gill was part of a team of Oxford researchers with the Centre for Evidence Based Medicine, who looked into the evidence – 550 studies – behind some sports products that promise enhanced athletic performance or improved muscle recovery.
What they found is that athletes and consumers spend millions of dollars annually on myths, products that don’t work, and that could actually do harm.
The study was requested by the British Medical Journal and the BBC and timed to coincide with the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, sponsored in part by some of the companies behind these products.
Gill, 26, specifically looked at whether consuming whey protein powder and carbohydrates after exercise helps improve performance recovery.
“Whey is an expensive protein,” he said in a phone interview from Oxford, “but it doesn’t really do anything different for the average person, than having a well balanced meal.
“For the elite bodybuilder, it’s a different story, but for the average person who goes to the gym a few times a week, having a protein shake is not going to make a big difference whether you get stronger or not.”
It’s something Gill discovered for himself when he was a competitive elite athlete. Substituting cottage cheese or a glass of milk after lifting weights was just as good as using protein powder and a lot cheaper.
As for sports drinks, for the average person, having a Powerade after exercising, basically neutralizes their workout because of the calories and sugar content comparable to a soft drink, Gill explains.
This is of particular concern to the future pediatrician, because even though a review of existing research found no studies involving children, they represent a huge market, targeted by sports drinks endorsed by elite athletes.
“If your hero is (Manchester United footballer) Wayne Rooney and he’s drinking Powerade, you’ll do whatever Wayne Rooney does to be like him,” observes Gill, who played competitive soccer in Canada on a provincial and national level.
He has the same concern about energy drinks like Red Bull.
Another member of the team, Braden O’Neill, a medical student at the University of Calgary who is also completing his PhD at Oxford, looked at whether energy drinks increase performance. He found any caffeine gives you a boost, which is why many people start the day with coffee, but it won’t “give you wings.”
“There is a real risk of harm in these, especially for adolescents, because the caffeine doses are very high and they’re really untested in children,” Gill says. “There have been several studies cautioning side effects which are quite concerning.”
He hopes the study “raises doubt about a massive industry” and makes not only the public, but health care professionals and sports trainers, aware of the power of the pitch, which can turn something like hydration into a disease, create a product for it, and then demand for that product.
Many claims have no scientific truth behind them, and those that do, the calibre of the research is very, very low, using small sample sizes and not acknowledging any harm, Gill says.
Don’t believe the advertising, he advises. Read product labels, and think before consuming something like a sports drink that contains 200 calories and 50 grams of sugar.
Like when you think about drinking before you’re thirsty: “your body has worked for millions of years using thirst,” Gill notes. If anything you perform better when you don’t drink before heading out for a run or a bike ride because you’re not adding a kilo of water to your weight.
“There’s no animal we would make drink water when they’re not thirsty. Why would we think we need to drink when we’re not thirsty?”
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