Web Doctor Articles

If you have been sweating up a thirst by exerting yourself physically, whether from an intense workout session or from just plain hard work, then you will quickly find that water alone may not be enough to tame your thirst. When you reach that intense stage of needing liquids, your body must have more than water to re-hydrate and recover. As a result of this need, the sports drink market has created a wide variety of sports beverage choices to help you quench that thirst.

Back in the day, old-timers who ranched across America used to brew up batches of what they called switchel. This might have been the original sport beverage and contained a mixture of molasses, vinegar and water, and was used during the intense physical exertion the ranchers experienced during haying season. For most people, their workouts have changed since that time, and fortunately so have the products on the market.

The various energy sports drinks and endurance drink bottles that are seen in the sports drink market no longer rely on vinegar and molasses, but the formulations still have some commonalities to those ingredients. Today, when you read the label on your favorite energy sports drink, you will primarily see the ingredients of sugar to supply carbohydrates, and minerals such as sodium and potassium which add electrolytes to the sports beverage.

This combination of carbohydrates and electrolytes found in endurance drink mixes essentially provides the same benefits to today’s athletes that the ranchers got from the switchel. The bottom line is that these extra ingredients give the body what it needs to re-hydrate quickly in order to replace the rapid loss of moisture from the body due to the physical exertion.

Every manufacturer of a sports beverage knows how important it is to keep an athlete’s body from becoming dehydrated. When dehydration occurs, performance is reduced. In addition, consuming the electrolyte sports drink formulations help to assure that the body does not become overheated which can cause problems and add stress to the cardiovascular system.

Even though many of the advertisements for sports beverage products put a lot of emphasis on the restoration and the balancing of electrolytes, many doctors say that the most important benefit in these recovery sports drinks comes from the carbohydrates. It is the carbs from the sugars that help to feed the muscles during the workout, help to replace energy stores, and help to delay fatigue, all of which improves endurance.

In the way of the ingredients, there is very little to distinguish the recovery sports drink formulations of the three major brands in the sports drink market. The big three names in energy sports drinks are Gatorade, All Sport and Powerade and all three of these brands have almost identical ingredients, although the actual amounts might vary slightly.

Well, it is almost swimsuit season and it is time to break out of that winter body and find the body you have always wanted. Nutritional shakes as well as other drinks might be the very ticket to a leaner, more muscular physique that you have forever hoped for. How will you accomplish this? Sports drinks are the way to get the calories and nutrients that you need while providing the proteins and vitamins yet none of the unwanted fats and carbohydrates. They help you to maintain hydration as well as making you prepared to get back into shape. You can start your way to swimsuit season by clicking here: Body Building Sports Supplement and at Bodybuilding Stimulants also Organic Bodybuilding Supplements