None of these 'sports products' work.....

According to Panorama tonight apparently

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-18863293

Looks like sports drinks, protein shakes and trainers all come under the programme's scrutiny from this short piece on the BBC website

Compared to what?  To not having anything and getting low on energy and dehydrated?

I like the comment to the effect that it's an expensive way of making you drink milk.  If £34 was the price to pay to make me drink milk for 3 months, and milk does work, then I'd be happy to pay that price!  I'm sure eventually I'd just get used to downing a pint of milk after a workout, but at the moment it doesn't cross my mind.  Big up for choco flavouring!

Milk isn't easy to transport to events where you will be away for several days and don't have access to a fridge.  Thats where sports drinks are useful, although if I liked milk I would be happy to drink that too.  Just saying that there is more to deciding what nutrition you use than price.

Most of the research that is conducted in the use of sports products (pretty much all that I've read) uses relatively small sample sizes, typically people who are far more active that the average person, and usually in one sporting discipline - often a static bike. And it's difficult to combine the research findings as there are often too many compounding variables. 

That said, there is evidence that the products do have an effect. It just depends on who is using them and why. If Joe Bloggs who goes to the gym and walks on the treadmill for twenty minutes expects their performance to be improved by drinking Lucozade, then it's not surprising there won't be much of an effect. If you want to run a marathon, and the alternative to a sports product is nothing, then I'd go with the Lucozade

I quite agree - a banging headache usually tells me my nutrition was wrong during/after an event.  Whatever it costs to stop/prevent that headache is fine with me

That said... I'm much more an advocate of food over synthetic products, although I quite accept the point that sports nutrition products are often much more convenient, albeit far more expensive. You can buy easy to carry products that are designed for specific needs (fueling, recovery, etc.) and deliver a set 'dose' of carbs/electrolytes/protein, without much thought/planning required.

Like I said though, I prefer food

And as for trainers - I'll be interested in seeing what the experiements/findings are. I love my trainers, bought based on gait analysis to suit my biomechanics. I don't think anyone will convince me that there's no evidence they make a difference. 

SuperCaz wrote (see)

Milk isn't easy to transport to events where you will be away for several days and don't have access to a fridge. 

Does anyone take a product to improve performance?! I have never grabbed an energy gel to improve my performance, only to maintain it. Training over the months before hand has dictated my performance. As already said, if the alternative is nothing then its a no brainer! I do like to take on board real food during long races but gels for example are often more convenient.

With regards to recovery drinks. I use milk, I like milk anyway so no problem for me and is easy to get after a training run. Not so much after a race so I will settle with the best option I can find/have ready at the time.

I think I may just be playing with words, but I'd take 'improve performance' to include maintaining it where it would otherwise begin to deteriorate. 

I'm quite looking forwards to Panorama tonight

It'll be interesting to see how things like Lucozade come out of it. There's no doubt that it does a couple of useful things for endurance exercise, namely rehydrate and replace carbs/electrolytes, but I think the grey area comes in interpretation of its claims, which have been highlighted above - i.e. what does it mean to improve performance?  If my long run / marathon would have been harder / slower without taking anything, doesn't that mean my performance has been improved because of it?  On the other hand, just because the gym-bunny treadmill warrior erroneously believes that swigging a bottle will make the 10 mins @ 5% incline feel easier, is that the fault of Lucozade?  Are Lucozade knowingly implying benefits that can't be substantiated, or just not being clear enough about where the benefits lie?

As for milk-based products... making it UHT is convenient for carrying around, and making it chocolate flavoured make it taste more yummy, both of which I'm willing to pay a premium for, whether it's marketed as a sports product or not.  Current favourite = Milky Way flavoured milk drink, which has a subtly different nutritional content to Galaxy and Mars Refuel, but it all tastes the same to me. 

Ok, well in that case I would say that they are no more efficient than real food but in a large number of instances they are as easy to get and more convenient in most race situations in terms of weight, ease of carrying, not getting too messy etc. Plus it is typically far easier for a race (with exception of ultra distance races) to provide gels/drinks vs real food.

It will be interesting to see what they come up with though

I found these articles of interest :

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/jul/27/sports-drinks

http://www.spma.net/recoverydrinksfin.htm

I'm going to be looking for others to read up on over the next few days too see what i can find. I suspect a lot of the Beebs report relates to energy drinks rather than recovery drinks and i would agree that a drink wont increase your ability at all, but i do think they aid you. Perhaps its the marketing angle that the Beeb are hitting out at.

As for protein shakes, ive always thought, you are probably just as well off eating a good diet to increase muscle mass.

I do tend to use Recovery drinks which are mixed with water rather than milk however, only using energy drinks, if i am doing 1hour+  and even then i often wont use them except on race day. I have used gels and energy tablets during races and they have seemed to have an effect, but i will only use these once ive passed the half way sage of a long run HM +.

In regards to puma statign that their trainers make you faster, then thats a no brainer, of course they don't.

And people taking these products and not exercising, well its their own fault if they haven't figured out that they are packed full of sugar!!!

found another good one :

http://blog.healthkismet.com/sports-drinks-health-nutritio

It's common sense isn't it.  Sports products are useful, even necessary, for some races, but for 90% of the time in training you could do equally well with food and water.   

I don't think keen long distance runners are the main target of this BBC programme.  Due to the marketing etc there's a lot of people who think they "need" they need lucozade sport or powerade etc to complete their 10mins on the treadmill.

When my son was playing junior football (under-nines) I'd estimate at least half of the kids were drinking bottles of sports drinks to replenish their energy (and a good proportion of the adults were drinking them as well).  The exercise involved didn't warrant this, but most people would believe they were consuming something healthy and not realising the sugar content. 

I think they refer to it as the 'health halo'. Products associated with healthy lifestyles are perceived by the public to confer health benefits, even if they are mis-used. Based on what I see at the local gym, most people don't have a clue about when it's appropriate to use sports nutrition products. Ten minutes of jiggling on a wave machine, not even breaking a sweat, then downing a protein shake...

I can see how drinking a bottle of powerade or lucozade and sitting on your backside will be bad for you, even drinking one on a 5k won`t be much use. But on Saturday I have a 25 mile (3.5hr) training run to do and I will not be doing it on water alone. Of course you can get all of the nutrients etc that you need from a varied diet but who whe you are running a marathon you want to be carrying as little as possible so gels / locozade from energy stations are ideal.

I`m sure if you are sensible they will help you, but there are always those who think that just eating and drinking all the products will make up for a lack of training.

My hubby refers to my energy drink mix as "beefcake powder", which says it all really. Does anyone remember that episode of Southpark?