What do you need for a good recovery drink? High-quality protein, easily digestible carbohydrates and minerals. So just stuff the currywurst in after the finish line, top it off with a glass of cola and a few pretzel sticks for the minerals. Right? Nutritionist Philipp Rauscher sees things a little differently: "If you want to recover quickly with sausages, cola and the like, you have to have a damn good stomach and shouldn't necessarily go full throttle again the next day."
Do not drink pure water
It is better to drink diluted juice spritzers, mineral water or special recovery drinks after the competition. Pure water flushes out more minerals than it contains. Use the first 20 to 40 minutes after the race in particular to provide yourself with proteins and carbohydrates. The so-called window of growth is then very large and the body absorbs the protein building blocks particularly well. The same applies to your glycogen stores. In addition to the window of growth, science has come up with a second window: the open window. The term comes from psychoneuroimmunology. The open window phenomenon describes the immunological gap after the organism has been subjected to sporting stress. What this means exactly is that there is an increased risk of illness (especially flu-like infections, urinary tract infections and diarrhoea) following physical or psychological stress.
For years, the food industry has been working on recipes to develop drinks that speed up recovery and also reduce the risk of illness.
You can find these MTB recovery drinks in the test:
- Active3 Regeneration
- Born Recovery
- Dextro After Sports Drink
- Energysystem Recovery
- High5 Protein Recovery
- Multipower Re-Charge Drink
- Powerbar Recovery
- Sponser Pro Recovery
- Squeezy Recovery Drink
- Ultrasports Refresher
- Vitargo Gainers Gold
- Xendurance Xecute
You can find an overview and a rating of the 12 recovery drinks for mountain bikers in the PDF download below.
