Sport nutritionists recommend that endurance athletes performing two workouts a day should ingest carbohydrates immediately following the first training session to rapidly replenish muscle glycogen. To meet this need, many nutritional products have been marketed as carbohydrate replacement drinks (CR) or fluid replacement drinks (FR) containing less carbohydrate.
Since chocolate milk has a similar carbohydrate content to that of many CR, it may be an effective means of recovery from exhausting exercise. The Counsilman Center for the Science of Swimming, under the direction of Dr. Joel Stager, tested the efficacy of chocolate milk (CM) as a recovery aid following exhausting exercise.
The results of this study suggest that, chocolate milk, with its high carbohydrate and protein content, may be considered an effective alternative to commercial FR and CR for recovery from exhausting, glycogen-depleting exercise.