Post exercise nutrition

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-24464774

Ian Botham was a cricket player, you know, the fat ones, that can still play at world class level as they stand around all day doing f all.

Define elite level athlete, there are plenty of decent level athletes on this board, I have no doubt I can get the same value from eating a chicken breast after a ride, but sometimes its far easier, cheaper, to have whey shake.

Whey protein a placebo

Gallywomack wrote:

I can certainly understand skepticism about some supplements, but whey is a straightforward food by-product and very useful stuff. You don't have to be an elite athlete to benefit from it.

I should walk away from this thread..............but I can't

First sentence; correct IMHO
Second sentence; well intentioned bunkum IMHO

Everyone I have talked to who has taken protein suppliments (including me), and as an ex gym rat for years thats quite a few, has agreed that they have noticed a darkening of their urine when taking said suppliments. Urea causes this colour and urea is metabolised waste PROTEIN. Yes thats right you pay for it, you consume it, your body has no use for the extra and .....................you pi$$ it out (this is an overly simplistic model but broadly accurate).

Even a bad modern diet has an excess of protein in it in most cases. In a personal example, my paternal grandfather was a 'Lumper' on, at the time, the busiest fish dock in the world (Lumpers manually unloaded fish in crates/baskets of ice from trawlers holds). This involved long and arduous physical effort that would exceed the effort of the vast majority of peeps on here. According to modern marketing, in order to sustain this 6 day a week effort suppliments were the only hope. Reality - Fry up every day for breakfast, oily fish sandwiches most lunchtimes and fish and potatoes for supper all in portions that would be considered small nowadays and he was super lean and strong as an Ox. The level of activity of the average person 60 years+ ago would likely have been about the same as weekend warriors in todays society and they just ate stuff

If you insist on using protein post ride and believe it helps that is fine. If you do, whey based products are probably best (in fact I do use them myself after Sportives when regular food is sometimes not available). However the people who NEED this type of post effort nutrition will not be reading this thread as their nutritionist will be telling them all they need to know. Nigel Mitchel the SKY and BC nutritionist has said a couple of times that when he rides he doesn't use the CNC products he helped to develop and SKY use under his direction. Why is this? He has no need of that level of nutrition and rides on bananas and water and eats a meal or (admittedly protein rich) snack post ride.