NUTRITION
Sugar isn’t always the enemy
Before deciding that it’s never your friend, consider the source of sugar as well as the intensity and length of your training sessions
By Shawn Hueglin
Shawn Hueglin, PhD, RD, CSSD is a sport dietitian with the United States Olympic Committee. She works primar- ily with team sports based in the Los Angeles area and the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Chula Vista, Calif.
perfect teaching moment. The lesson: sport bars – and sport drinks, too – are formulated with quick carb sources that include sugar and designed to eat surrounding training. Sugar, when coupled with other nutrients, is an important source of fuel that can help you perform well throughout lengthy weightlifting sessions or rigorous volleyball practices. When thinking about sugar intake, consider the physical demands you’re requiring of your body. If you are over an hour into an intense training session that will last several hours, you probably need a boost, even if you had a snack or a meal before you started. This boost might be a sport drink, bar, gummy or a piece of fruit, all containing sugar.
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On the other hand, if you’re sitting on the couch watching a movie with your friends, a sport bar or drink designed for training is not the best choice.
ADDED SUGAR VS. NATURALLY OCCURRING SUGAR
You probably know that there’s a differ- ence between eating a spoonful of sugar, drinking a can of soda and eating a banana or sweet potato. However, this often gets lost in the translation when athletes talk about sugar in their meals and snacks. All sources get lumped together. Furthermore, it’s not so much that the body recognizes the sugar dif- ferently; it’s that everything else surrounding it is different.
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thletes often talk to me about how much sugar there is in eating certain nutritional sport bars, and that’s a
Take, for example, a 12-ounce can of regu- lar soda vs. a cup of blueberries (see photo above). The soda has about 10 teaspoons (or 40 grams) of sugar. The blueberries? Just 2.5 teaspoons. But there is also the fact that blueberries have about 3 grams of fiber and a whole slew of vitamins, minerals and antioxi- dants. So you might say that’s “good sugar” or nutrient rich food. But the soda is basically a can of sugar with no added benefit, making it nutrient poor.
It helps to increase your awareness about what types of food you regularly eat that contain the most added sugar. Some common places to look include cereal, muffins, cereal bars, sweetened teas, flavored drinks, flavored coffee drinks, frozen yogurt, cakes, cookies, candy and desserts. One part of being aware is knowing what sources of sugar to look for on an ingredient list. Sugar isn’t always just listed as sugar. It has many aliases – among them, glucose, fructose and lactose. Here’s a list to help you keep track of
what’s what: Sugar ending in ‘ose’ (dextrose, fructose, glucose, lactose, maltose, sucrose), corn syrup, corn sweetener, maple syrup, honey, molasses, brown sugar, sugar in the raw, organic sugar, evaporated cane juice, fruit juice concentrate (orange, grape, apple), high fructose corn syrup, agave, nectars.
FOOD THAT’S SIMILAR BUT DIFFERENT To illustrate a point about choices, consider yogurt. Not all yogurts have the same sugar content, and some is added while some occurs naturally in milk (lactose). Fruit-flavored
yogurt tends to have more added sugar, which can be from actual fruit or fruit and sugar fla- voring. On the other hand, plain yogurt only contains naturally occurring sugar, which is often the best option so you can add fresh or frozen fruit and control the amount of added sweetness with honey, maple syrup or agave.
THE DEFINITION OF A TREAT Another factor to consider – and one emphasized before in this column – is that there is nothing wrong with the occasional sweet treat, but “occasional” is the key word. If you are having frozen yogurt, a candy bar or a sweet muffin three or four times a week, that is not occasional; it’s a habit. A treat is something eaten less frequently and special – once every week or two.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING WHEN YOUR DIET IS HIGH IN ADDED SUGAR
Generally, when training meals and snacks contain more added sugar, there is less space in your calorie budget for nutrient dense foods. These foods are beneficial to both your health and your athletic performance, particularly in your ability to adapt to training sessions day after day and week after week. To strike the right balance, keep track of where the majority of your carbohydrates are coming from. If you determine that they’re coming from mostly foods with added sugar, make changes. Consider exchanging these sources for more fruits, veggies, whole grains and potatoes that contain vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, phytochemicals and fiber.
PHOTO: PETER BROUILLET
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