Every time I work out or go for a run I always drink chocolate milk afterwards. I first started doing this  because I heard that it was good for you and even though I thought it was weird, I still believed it and tried it. Now I’m curious and dying to know if it really is better for us to drink something like chocolate milk versus drinking just water. Although I do not get as much vigorous activity into my schedule as I would like I always wonder, “What are the healthiest things I can do for my body?” I thought water would be the source of many of my dieting habit issues, such as staying hydrated day after day. As we all know we need more than just water to maintain a healthy lifestyle. Like I said in my last post, Too Much Water Can Kill! However, water is not the only necessity to healthy living; you need protein and nutrients to maintain a healthy balance.

As I was searching for support on drinking chocolate milk after workouts I came across the Got Chocolate Milk? campaign. The Got Chocolate Milk? campaign explains how there are multiple vitamins and electrolytes to refuel your body more efficiently than a typical sports drink or water. I find the campaign very interesting as it is practically the same campaign as Got Milk? but it goes into more detail about after workouts. It shows many famous athletes to promote the campaign as well; I’m sure most are familiar with Got Milk? posters in school cafeterias with athletes and celebrities with their milk mustaches. However, just because we see famous people smiling with milk mustaches and saying something they were told to say does not mean we should completely believe it; so I continued my search.

This photo can be found here.

            As seen in this article, you can benefit from chocolate milk after a workout in four ways; you can rehydrate, recover, build muscles, and improve your performance overall. Water does not contain electrolytes or protein so drinking chocolate milk to rehydrate will not only quench your thirst but provide you with all the nutrients you lost through sweating. Chocolate milk can also help heal any micro tears that could have happened in the muscles. Speaking of muscles, chocolate milk can help build your muscles and help get rid of unwanted fat. Lastly chocolate milk can improve your overall performance by increasing your endurance.

            The study they mention in this WebMD article uses a double-blind placebo trail on athletic men to see whether they benefit more from a sports beverage or a glass of chocolate milk but this study only included men, where women are unaccounted for. Although men and women are both human they assume that women will have the same effect, however, women are very different from men and assuming things in experiments never prove anything. It makes sense that it would have the same effect on women as it does to men but can we be sure that this assumption is correct? I know some people may not approve of the assumption that women have the same effect with chocolate milk but I believe it is a safe assumption to make.