This weeks journal club comes at a time when the UK is under a blanket of snow, which means that it’s a good excuse to stay inside and read the article! We will be looking at the following article for this journal club:
The paper has been chosen by Kate Pumpa who is a sports dietitian, exercise physiologist and lecturer at the University of Canberra in Australia.
Have a read of the paper and critically analyse it. Think about the strengths and weaknesses of the research so we can decide on the usefulness of the findings. Is the study design appropriate for the research question? Do you think that the authors have used the correct statistics to analyse the results and have they interpreted them fairly? Add your comments below.
I will summarise our comments on the weekend of 18th February and the next paper will be posted then too!
Hi Becky,
I am currently training for the London marathon and i am keen advocate of chocolate milk after each training run (I use Nesquick chocolate powder and mix with skimmed milk). A former work colleague used to swear by them, i was a tad sceptical at first but having undertook some research i found it is common for athletes of all levels across a wide range of sports to use chocolate shakes over the more common (and expensive) over the counter recovery powders and shakes.
During my research i came across a triathlete called DC Rainmaker who is also an advocate and he posted a study on Chocolate Milk V Enderox R4 Recovery drink. See below
http://www.dcrainmaker.com/2009/03/chocolate-milk-vs-endurox-r4-recovery.html
Regards
Wayne
Hi Becky,
Good work setting this up, hopefully you will get a lot of uptake and envoke more discussion.
The journal was an enjoyable read, so I thought I would put my 2 pence in!
For the aims of the research, the study design seems tight and well constructed. However it is already well understood that with moderate training the timings of recovery nutrition are less important for recovery, rather what is being consumed in the 24 hours between training sessions is more important. As the diets were matched and isocalorific over the two interventions, the results were fairly predictable. Also as there was no control trial (where no recovery drink was consumed in the first 2 hours by the subjects) we are none the wiser with regards to the effects of consuming a recovery drink. The recovery nutrition could possibly have be met by the subject habitual diet in-between each training session, and neither drink having an impact on recovery.
Also, what may be interesting is if the researchers replicated the study with a couple of adaptations to study design:
1) Cause a greater demand on recovery timings (i.e. training twice a day). This would then provide greater training stimulus, and muscle damage, resulting in more stress on the athletes nutritional status.
2) Add in a control group.
So I suppose my conclusion is; for the recreational athlete, chocolate milk is the answer! But for a well trained athlete/athlete in heavy training I would investigate into the literature more.
That was a nice read. The study was was well thought-out and the results were presented quite clearly. I agree with the previous reply; inclusion of a control (only water in the recovery period?) would have made the study more complete. I don’t have a good feel for how much recovery beverages help in general. I would have liked to see why the specific recovery beverage was chosen and how it compares to its competitors (i.e. energy, protein, carb, fat, like in table 2).
I’ve heard cycling is used frequently in physiological trials because it is the easiest to control and monitor so I’d assume that’s the case in this study. I wonder how the endurance activity of cycling compares to weight lifting, for example. This may be out of the scope of the study, but it would have been nice to see why cycling was used and how applicable the conclusions are to different forms of exercise, specifically endurance vs. strength training.
Though deliciousness was left out of the study, I think we all know which would win
.
Cheers,
Henry
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