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Sugar, Sports Drinks, and Performance

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Fructose, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Sucrose and Health

Part of the book series: Nutrition and Health ((NH))

Key Points

Sports drinks represent a convenient way to ingest water, sugar, and salt during physical activity, three nutrients that provide physiological and performance benefits.

In addition to improving various aspects of physical and cognitive performance, sugar ingestion during exercise also enhances voluntary fluid consumption, blunts the stress hormone response to intense and prolonged exercise, reduces subjective ratings of perceived exertion, and sustains the activity of aspects of immune response.

During strenuous physical activity, consuming a sports drink to replace the water and salts lost in sweat and to supply sugars to fuel active skeletal muscles and the central nervous system is perhaps the simplest, easiest, and least expensive way to improve performance.

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  1. Sports Science Insights, LLC, 1213 Autumn Ridge Court, Crystal Lake, IL, 60014, USA

    Robert Murray Ph.D., F.A.C.S.M.

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    James M. Rippe

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Murray, R. (2014). Sugar, Sports Drinks, and Performance. In: Rippe, J. (eds) Fructose, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Sucrose and Health. Nutrition and Health. Humana Press, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-8077-9_18

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