Refuel with Chocolate Milk

What if I told you the best thing for your body after a strenuous workout is chocolate milk? Think I’m crazy? Well, keep reading.

Post-workout recovery is an often overlooked but essential part of every workout routine. You just put your body through a ringer, it deserves to get a little pampered. Not doing so can be detrimental to your health.

One of the best ways to help your body is by picking the right post-recovery drink. Popular choices include water and sports drinks, but the real rising star is chocolate milk. That’s right, scientists have discovered that your favorite childhood drink is one of the best post-workout refueling options.

Over 20 recent studies show that drinking chocolate milk after intense exercise proved either more effective or as effective as water and most sports drinks. Compared to water and most sports drinks, chocolate flavored milk has more carbohydrates and proteins, which are essential in rebuilding muscles after an intense workout.

There are three essential parts to post-recovery workout: rehydrating, muscle recovery, and restoring energy. Chocolate milk’s got you covered.

It’s exercise. You sweat. Working up a nice sweat feels amazing, but you’ve got to make sure you replace the fluids you lost to prevent dehydrating. Chocolate milk is 90% water, so it goes a long way in helping you rehydrate. The sodium and sugar additives help athletes retain water and regain energy. It’s also full of vital nutrients like calcium, potassium, magnesium, and sodium, which replenishes critical nutrients lost in sweat.

Exercise breaks your muscles down, so it’s vital to give them a boost afterwards. The proteins in chocolate milk reduce muscle breakdown and aid in muscle rebuilding and recovery by rebuilding muscle fibers. The carbohydrates in chocolate milk also fuels muscles during exercise and helps them recover.

Intense exercise makes you feel a bit tuckered out. After draining out all that energy, you need to do your body a favor and give it some new fuel. Chocolate flavored milk to the rescue. The carbohydrates in chocolate milk help your body refill depleted glycogen and stored carbs, giving it some much needed energy.

There are benefits to drinking chocolate flavored milk beyond helping you recover from intense exercise thanks to all the vital nutrients in it. Calcium, vitamin D, and phosphorus help keep your bones strong. Potassium aids in fluid and mineral balance and muscle contraction. B vitamins help convert food to energy to aid working muscles. And, of course, chocolate milk is great for improving overall bone health. Bones continue to grow until you’re about 35 years old, so strengthening your bones with milk is essential. Not to mention, it's simply delicious.

The next time you’re about to tackle that workout routine, consider drinking chocolate milk afterwards. Your body will thank you. Learn more about chocolate milk’s refueling properties here.