I read an article today on RealAge.com entitled “Not seeing workout results? Drink this.” It says that a 12 week study showed that drinking 8-16 ounces of non-fat milk after a strength training workout burns five times as much fat and builds twice as much muscle as drinking sports drinks.
The article goes on to say that apparently the perfect combination of calcium, vitamin D, and healthy proteins is just what your body needs after a workout. The problem with this study building a case for milk is that it didn’t compare milk to nothing or milk to water, it compared milk to sports drinks (or salty Kool-aid). It then says that because it worked better than sports drinks, it must be all of its wonderful features and benefits that make it so wonderful.
I’ve used this analogy before but it’s similar to calling Pepsi a healthy beverage because it killed 99% less people when consumed than heavily radioactive material.
After going on for a while about it they do throw in a quick sentence that I was surprised to see that said strength training with water may have the same effect but this is only after they’ve made their case for drinking milk after a workout.
Now, don’t get me wrong. This is not an anti-milk campaign I’m launching here. I just want to point out how these studies get twisted around to mean things that they don’t actually mean.
The really interesting thing to me though is not the article, but the comments. As of the time I’m writing this, the article has 3 comments. These are what I’m more interested in because it shows the state of the people that have to listen to this constant barrage of misinformation. I hope you’ll find it interesting as well.
First we have Alfalfa14394 who says:
Drink this… I agree with the docs. I am a 51 yr old woman and when I do any work out hard or not I find that when I drink a glass of 1% milk or a 8oz glass of kefir I feel better and the hunger pangs stay away. I live in the desert and all fluid is good, especially milk.
Next there’s Bayleaf15965 who says:
Drinking milk… Non fat or regular milk is not good for anyone except babies. I go along with Dr. Frank Lipman who gives many reasons why we SHOULD NOT DRINK MILK. For that matter dairy products are not healthy generally either. And for me there is an ethical reason. The way we are raising our cows today is very cruel and an abomination. Soy milk is fine for me as well as soy cream cheese and sour cream. Healthier and I don't cause any innocent animal suffering.
And Last we have Set2Go7238 who says:
I was told recently that you cant build muscle unless you are training like an elite athelete or a body builder? is this wrong? I was told that I can make my muscles stronger but not build them? I am a 45 year old women doing regular resistance excercise. Are you saying that it is possible for me to build muscle? I am a little confused :-)
OK, so why am I bringing your attention to the comments? Because I know that they are not alone. I know that many of you may be floundering in the same pools of misinformation that just leave you stuck. Now I’m going to go through them.
Notice the difference between the first and second one? One says, I agree with this and milk is great and the other says, no one but babies should drink milk for both health and moral reasons. So who’s right?
Well I have to tell you that if I had no other knowledge of milk than just this I would go with the first one. I don’t care that one of them got their information from someone that had a lot of schooling and can put some letters around his name. The reason I would go with the first one is because she says that it works for her. It makes her feel better. The other commenter has just jumped on someone else’s crusade and has no information to offer of her own based on her own experience.
If you need to know my take on it it’s this. Milk is an incredibly healthful food with an amazing amount of health benefits. I would go so far as to call milk one of the few real “super foods”. However, just like almost all other natural foods, once you start screwing with it, you can turn something from healthy into poison. Milk is no exception.
When you give animals a nutrient deficient and health damaging cheap diet, load them up with hormones and antibiotics so they produce several times as much milk as they should and don’t die from the conditions they’re left in, let them stand in their own feces, and keep tubes connected to their udders that cause sores to form that leak into the product, you’re going to have a bad product. Then when you pasteurize it cause you now have to kill the disease you’ve caused which destroys the once healthy proteins and then homogenize it so it’s nice and smooth thereby damaging the once healthy fats, the end product doesn’t even begin to resemble what it could have been.
So is milk bad? No, milk is fantastic! Is mass produced garbage milk from damaged animals that is then processed to get rid of all the diseases and germs healthy? Probably not so much. If you want good milk, get it raw from a farm that comes from pasture raised, grass fed, organic, healthy, social cows. One taste and you’ll know that the flavorless, watery crap you get at the grocery store is not really milk. Also, this takes out any moral dilemma as the animals are actually well taken care of. If you can’t get raw milk, the next best thing is something like this.
It doesn't have to be this brand but this is what's in my fridge right now. The important things are Non-homogenized (fat isn't damaged), grass fed, (healthy diet+free roaming happy cow) and organic (no hormones or excessing drugs) is what you’re looking for.
Now for the last commenter… Notice she didn’t even mention milk? She just wants someone to be straight with her as to whether or not it’s possible to build muscle! This is simply a product of too many people spouting out too much nonsense in order to sell a product as well as people like this, making studies about things they’re not really about to get people to read their articles.
Remember the title of this article? “Not seeing workout results? Drink this.” Obviously it’s meant to get people curious enough to click on it and that’s fine. I have no problem with that. The problem I have is that they’re being dishonest in their selling of the story.
The title should have read, “Find out which beverage is 5 times more effective at burning fat than sports drinks.” Now people that don’t know how this works and skim through the article are duped into thinking that all they have to do is drink milk after a workout and they’ll build a bunch of muscle and burn a ton of fat. It’s not even what the article is about but you have poor, confused Set2Go7238 that just can’t make heads or tails of it and just wants a straight answer!
If you’re interested in reading the article btw, here’s the link below…
http://www.realage.com/blogs/doctor-oz-roizen/not-seeing-workout-results-drink-this?cbr=TWTTR01
In closing…
Many people ask me why I write this blog and I’d have to tell you, it certainly isn’t for the money. I write this blog for two reasons. First is my love for the topics, and second is because I feel an obligation. Health is a wonderful and important thing and it should be treated that way. I have a passion for being healthy and feeling better and I’m shocked daily by the amount of people that treat it solely as a source of income. Hey, it’s fine to make money in the health field, but if you’re going to take money for anything, provide a proper product or service to the people paying you. Today, the field that I love so much is tainted with mountains of bad information and snake oil. Half the people that think they’re giving out good information anymore have been so tainted by it all that they are inadvertently giving wrong advice themselves.
Because of this, I feel that it is my obligation to do what I can to set the record straight. Maybe I can’t stand up to the mountains of new fad diets coming out daily but I can get to a few people and they can maybe get to a few more until a difference is actually made. This is why I say, if you like the articles, share them on Facebook or Stumbleupon, retweet or Digg them, or even just send an “old fashion” email to a friend. You do something to get the word out and I’ll keep telling everyone the truth.
Until next time,
Kris
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