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The Endurance Athlete's Recovery Drink
Recovery is arguably the most important aspect of performance enhancement. Training is paramount, and when your training is good, you need to recover better. For endurance athletes, recovery is especially important because our legs take such a beating with each workout. We need to regain the muscle glycogen used up during exercise AND heal damaged muscle fibers. There are really only 2 ways to recover effectively. 1 – rest for 3 or more days. 2 – optimize your nutritional strategies to meet the intense demands of your sport. The most important step in optimizing your nutrition is eating the right amounts of fats, carbohydrates, and proteins each day. The second step is timing your food optimally throughout the day. The most important times for athletes to fuel are before, during, and after training. Before exercise you are getting ready to PERFORM; during exercise your goal is to SUSTAIN; and after exercise your goal is to RECOVER.
RecoverElite is the best recovery formula for endurance athletes (and most other athletes) – scientifically engineered to refuel and repair exhausted muscles after training. Following exercise, rates of muscle glycogen resynthesis are optimized with mostly fast digesting carbohydrates (sugars) at a dose of 1.0 – 1.2 grams of carbohydrate per kilogram of body weight. Muscle protein synthesis is the name of the repair process for muscle fibers. Muscle protein synthesis is maximized with 0.25 – 0.30 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight. This is why a 4:1 ratio of carbohydrate to protein is recommended as the best combination. What is left out of this equation is the leucine threshold. Leucine is an essential amino acid whose job is to initiate protein synthesis. Most products, if they even have a 4:1 ratio, do NOT have enough leucine to completely trigger muscle protein synthesis, which occurs at a dose of 0.05 grams of leucine per kilogram body weight.
RecoverElite is formulated for a 50 kg athlete for two reasons. 1 – high-level female endurance athletes are about 50 kg, and 2 – well-trained men are about 75 kg. This makes dosing easy at 1.0 – 1.5 servings! If you think this is going to cost you, it’s not. You can check our competitor analysis here. When looking for product efficacy, there is no better value than RecoverElite, which uses the highest quality ingredients like Whey Protein Isolate (90% pure protein)! RecoverElite also features an efficacious dose of Carnitine to reduce oxidative stress and facilitate muscle damage repair; AstraGin to increase intestinal nutrient absorption; electrolytes to replace those lost in sweat, and B vitamins to facilitate metabolism! If you train hard, RecoverElite!
Cane Sugar – Cane sugar is a natural form of sucrose, the disaccharide of glucose and fructose. Usually, large quantities of sugar are unwanted, but post-exercise is the exception. High glycemic sugars quickly get into muscles to restock muscle glycogen.
Fructose – Fructose complements the other carbohydrates in RecoverElite to take advantage of multiple transporters in the intestine to greatly enhance carbohydrate uptake.
CCD – Cluster Cyclic Dextrin is a moderate speed carbohydrate in terms of digestion. Having a variety of fast and moderate digestion speeds may increase total carbohydrate uptake over a 1 hour period.
Rice Starch – A small quantity of rice starch is included in RecoverElite to prevent reactive hypoglycemia in response to the fast-digesting carbohydrates commonly observed ~45 minutes after consumption of sugars.
Whey Protein Isolate – Whey is the most potent protein source for enhancing muscle reparation processes, and the elaborate extraction process keeps protein intact while removing nearly all carbohydrates and fats. Whey increases muscle protein synthesis, decreases soreness, accelerates recovery, and boosts immunity.
L-Leucine – Leucine is the amino acid in protein that is responsible for initiating protein synthesis. Protein synthesis is required for muscle recovery.
L-Carnitine L-Tartrate – Carnitine transports fatty acids into the mitochondria so they may be converted into ATP. However, supplementing carnitine shows even greater abilities for repairing damaged muscle tissue.
AstraGin® – AstraGin activates intestinal transporters to increase absorption of nutrients in RecoverElite.
Electrolytes – The major electrolyte minerals include sodium, chloride, potassium, magnesium, and calcium. In addition to the prevention of cramping, each has their own unique function. Sodium is the primary intracellular electrolyte, while potassium is the primary extracellular mineral. Calcium has numerous roles, but the most relevant to exercise is its responsibility for initiating muscle contractions. Chloride is the most abundant negatively charged ion with several roles in gut function and cell homeostasis. Last but not least, magnesium is a co-factor for hundreds of reactions, most of which are related to nutrient metabolism, muscle and vascular tone, and antioxidant synthesis.
B-Vitamins – RecoverElite contains the biologically active forms of B vitamins most crucial to carbohydrate, fat, and protein metabolism. These include B6, B9, and B12 or pyridoxal 5’ phosphate, folate, and methylcobalamin, respectively.
What is the best way to take RecoverElite?
Generally speaking, women should take 1 serving and men should take 1.5 servings of RecoverElite for optimized recovery. RecoverElite is formulated so that one serving meets the needs of a 50 kg athlete, as well-trained women are about 50 kg, and trained men are about 75 kg. However, your specific needs may not fit these parameters, so if you want to be specific in your dosing, take 1 serving per 50 kg of body weight. An exception to that rule is if you’re a man over 20% body fat or a woman over 30% body fat, in which case the 1 – 1.5 serving(s) rule still applies.
If you are competing or training multiple times in the same day, you may want to use 1 – 1.5 serving(s) immediately and every 1 – 4 hours thereafter between bouts of exercise. While we still recommend RecoverElite immediately post-exercise due to its rapid digestion, meals could easily serve you just as well in the 1 – 4 hour intervals between bouts of exercise.
What makes RecoverElite the best? Why should I use it?
You should use RecoverElite any time you are going to use the same muscle groups on back-to-back days or sessions. Most recovery products are underdosed, but RecoverElite is not. While some companies only consider their bottom line and worry whether or not athletes will purchase their products, we know that athletes want what’s best, so we put you first! That’s why we have clearly laid out dosing protocols and an optimal 4:1 ratio of an ideal blend of carbohydrates and easily digested whey isolate with additional leucine to maximally stimulate recovery processes. In addition to the basics, we’ve also included 3 other key supplements to enhance absorption, metabolism, and insulin sensitivity, and quite simply, this is something no other product offers.
What is the significance of a 4:1 ratio?
The 4:1 ratio comes from what has been determined to be the optimal amounts of carbohydrate and protein for glycogen resynthesis and muscle damage repair. In isolation, carbohydrates are most effective for glycogen resynthesis at 1.0 – 1.2 grams per kilogram body weight, and protein is most effective for increasing rates of muscle protein synthesis at 0.25 – 0.30 grams per kilogram body weight. This happens to work out perfectly to a 4:1 ratio. Carbohydrates and proteins consumed in combination post-exercise also enhance each other’s efficacy, a synergistic effect.
I've tried a bunch of recovery drink mixes and was always turned off by weird texture or taste. RecoverElite is so smooth and light and good. I've even stopped making my own favorite custom smoothie, because RecoverElite is just better. Fills me up, replenishes me, and is the best motivation to crush those last few miles when I know I have a chilled sports bottle of it waiting for me in the car.
Look forward to this after the hard efforts! Tastes great, hits the right mix of protein/carbs, and it helps to be taking something from a company I trust.
