Maximizing Energy Uptake for Endurance Athletes

Maximizing Energy Uptake for Endurance Athletes

One of our competitors used eggs to demonstrate how their sports drink does a better job of hydrating than other products. Unfortunately, the example is deliberately misleading because it doesn’t explain what happens when you use a product with complex carbs (like e-Gel or e-Fuel) instead of products that are 100% simple sugar (their product). If they had, you would see that you can hydrate just as well with complex carb based products, but your total energy uptake will be significantly higher. That’s why most of the good products on the market that athletes have used successfully for years are made with maltodextrin. Maltodextrin is a very long chain complex carbohydrate made from corn that has been proven over and over to be the best carb source for endurance athletes.

Recreating the Experiment

The image above is a jar of fresh eggs submersed in vinegar. Over the next few days the vinegar will dissolve the egg shells, leaving the egg encased in it’s semi-permeable membrane. This simulates our cellular system and will then be used to demonstrate the osmosis process and what happens when you use products made with simple sugars vs complex carbohydrates.

While the eggs dissolve you may want to watch this short video in which I explain why the complex carb based products will out perform those with 100% sugar.

Video: simple sugars vs. complex carbs

Enjoy!

– Mike

Mike Mathewson
President
Crank Sports, Inc.