Milk: It does a body good?

Today, I was asked about drinking chocolate milk as a recovery drink. I love questions like this. I feel my brain turn on, it starts spitting out pros and cons along with the why’s and why not’s of each. My brain feels like a rolodex. It keeps spinning until comes to the right data. Luckily, I had posed this same question to myself yesterday. I began debating this question after reading a book my dad had given me probably 15 years ago.
My dad was a well- known coach in our State. He coached girls Varsity soccer for years. His team was feared by many… they held several state titles. He was one of the best coaches in Vermont and one of the first coaches to teach his athletes about proper nutrition (almost unheard of back then). My dad was a GREAT coach! My point is, if my dad thought it was a book was worth reading, then I needed to read it.

The book is called Nancy Clark’s Sports Nutrition Guidebook: Eating to Fuel Your Active Lifestyle. I, of course, started researching Nancy Clark and goggled the heck out of her yesterday. I wanted to know everything about her and her view on nutrition for athletes.
To make a boring story short, Nancy Clark talks about using chocolate milk as a recovery drink.

Clark says that athletes should take in a 4:1 ratio of carbs to high quality protein an hour after training, which is when your body is most receptive to recovery nutrients. Taken alone, carbs or protein are not as effective

"If you take in just carbs, it will refuel the muscles but not repair them," says Clark. "Protein will repair them but not refuel them. You want a foundation of carbs, because that is what gets stored as glycogen. Then, if you have a little bit of protein, it stimulates the production of insulin, which enhances the transport of sugar into the muscle to replace depleted glycogen."

Clark recommends putting down 16 ounces of low fat chocolate milk within an hour after working out. This will provide about 320 calories, 52 grams of carbs, 16 grams of protein and 5 grams of fat.

I came across a few studies
The first titled: Effects of recovery beverages on glycogen restoration and endurance exercise performance.(J Strength Cond Res. 2003 Feb;17(1):12-9) The findings indicate that the rate of recovery is coupled with the rate of muscle glycogen replenishment and suggest that recovery supplements should be consumed to optimize muscle glycogen synthesis as well as fluid replacement.

So in English…this study suggests that a "recovery beverage" should replenish glycogen stores quickly to be most effective. How do we do that? Combine Carbs with a little protein. It does not have to be CHOCOLATE MILK. It could be anything that offers high carbs and a little protein in 4-1 ratio.

The second study, supported by a grant from the National Dairy Council and National Fluid Milk Processor Promotion Board, took eight male runners in good physical shape ate a balanced diet for two weeks. At the end of each week, they took a fast paced, 45-minute run.

Following each run, the men drank either 16 ounces of fat-free chocolate milk or 16 ounces of a carbohydrate-only sports beverage with the same number of calories.

Post-exercise muscle biopsies showed increased skeletal muscle protein synthesis, a sign that muscles were better able to rebuild, after the milk drink, compared with the carb-only beverage.
Additionally, drinking fat-free chocolate milk led to a higher concentration of glycogen, or muscle fuel, in muscles 30 and 60 minutes after exercise, compared with the sports drink. Replenishing glycogen after exercise helps future performance.

So what’s the bottom line?
Try it. See if it works for you.
My precaution would be:
1. Watch out for those non-post WOD glasses of Chocolate Milk. Recovery drink should be consumed within the first 30 min.-2hrs post WOD and then again 2 hours after that.
2. If you have NOT been consuming the evil white stuff or any of its cousins (sugar, cane juice, etc.) you may have some diarrhea
3. If you follow the Paleo diet, which means you have been excluding dairy, you may have difficulty digesting milk...more diarrhea and stomach cramps.
4. NOT all Chocolate milk is created equal. READ THE LABELS. Avoid the ones that contain High Fructose Corn Syrup!! or Artifical flavors. Horizon or Organic Chocolate milk is best.
What would I do since I’m strict Paleo and I prefer to keep dairy (especially milk) out of my diet?
I would choose Almond Chocolate milk and add protein powder. Almond milk does not have a significant amount of protein. Other Options would be:

Dried Fruit and Protein Shake
OR
Banana (carb) and Protein Shake (Protein)
OR
approx. 16 oz. Fruit Juice (carb) and 14g Protein powder
OR
Apple Juice (carb) and approx. 3oz.Turkey roll-up (protein)
OR
2 Hard Boiled eggs and approx 16oz. Fruit juice
OR
16 oz. Lactaid Chocolate Milk (if your not strict paleo and cant tolerate milk)

You get the idea. The tricky part would be getting the 4:1 ratio. But once you figure it out, you’re golden. I can easily figure out exact amounts for you if you are interested.

Im stressing a mix of fruits and Protein shake rather than a Post Workout shake because food offers so many more nutrients than the processed, mass produced POST Workout shake. PRUE Whey protein or PRUE Egg protein Im fine with. It's the stuff that has been mixed and manipulated that Im not so crazy about.

Remember, what works for one person not necessarily will work for YOU! We are all unique individuals who require different nutrients. Our bodies metabolize foods differently.
BUT you’ll never know until you try!