Are Sports Drinks A Waste Of Money, Or Do They Actually Enhance Performance?

Gyms are funny places. They're supposed to be a haven for the health-conscious to help lose a few pounds, get fit and gawp at the scantily-clad gym junkies with perfect bodies, but the reality is somewhat different – except the gawping, everyone's guilty of that! Every day, people waste time and money by visiting the gym, hopping on an exercise bike and then flicking through the latest edition of a glossy magazine, with a sports drink as light refreshment. Their effort level on the bike is so low even a corpse could rival their energy expenditure!

A bottle of sports drink contains around 150 calories (mainly sugar) and unless I am underestimating the energy required to turn the pages of Cosmopolitan and flirt with the gym instructor, there are some people who would struggle to burn 150 calories in a session. By drinking a bottle or two of a sports drink there is every chance you might leave the gym having consumed more calories than you've expended.

For casual exercisers, though arguably less flavoursome than some sports drinks, water is the best fluid to consume during a workout. Water contains no calories and will re-hydrate you as effectively as any sports drink, provided your session is of medium intensity and no longer than 90 minutes.

There are some instances, however, where the use of sports drinks is not unjustified and in some cases actually essential to maintain performance. For intense exercise bouts lasting for over an hour, sports drinks help to re-hydrate the body more quickly and more effectively than water, as well as assist in replacing lost sugars and salts.

For those in training for a marathon, sports drinks are a necessary addition to the diet both during and after a long-distance run. During a marathon race there are up to 5 sports drinks stations scattered around the 26.2 mile course for this very reason.