Unfortunately no, all carbohydrates are NOT the same. Independent research on endurance athletes has shown the benefits of complex carbohydrates such as maltodextrin over sugar, sucrose, glucose, dextrose and other form of simple sugar. A little bit of simple sugar is okay when used in conjunction with complex carbohydrates, but you should look for sports drinks that contain no more than 50% sugars. I personally only use products that are at least two thirds complex carbohydrates. To determine what’s in your favorite sports drink, examine the nutriton label and look at the carbohydrate grams and the sugar grams, if they are the same then the product is 100% simple sugar. The problem with high levels of simple sugars is that they elevate your blood sugar far to high and to rapidly. If you could maintain this inflated blood sugar level it would be great for performance, but unfortunately you can’t. In a short time period your blood sugar level will come crashing back down even lower than before you consumed the sugar. You are then left feeling lethargic and even worse your body can no longer as efficiently convert your muscle glycogen into usable energy. In addition, sugar consumption has been shown to inhibit your body’s ability to burn fat as an energy source which is completely counter productive to athletic performance.

This “sugar crash” happens to kids when you give them candy, they run around like crazy followed by the crash. It happens to adults when we eat a desert loaded with sugar – we’re real happy for a while but then a little later we’re ready to doze off on the couch. When this happens to athletes we call it “bonking” (it sounds more athletic than a sugar crash).

Maltodextrin and other complex carbohydrates have additional significant performance benefits over simple sugars including allowing your body to derive up to twice as much energy per hour. This is due to the fact that water/fluid is the transport vehicle that allows the carbohydrates to be absorb and converted into blood sugar to fuel your muscles, and the amount of carbohydrate that can be transported by the fluid is limited. Fluids are absorbed through osmosis when they are equal in concentration to your body fluids (isotonic). Sports drinks that contain complex carbohydrates instead of simple sugars can contain nearly twice as much energy in an isotonic state compared to drinks containing 100% simple sugars. This is explained by the fact that the molecular structure of complex carbohydrates by definition is much larger than that of simple sugars, so as you add complex carbohydrates to the drink it increases the concentration (osmolality) more slowly thus allowing more total calories to be available at the point of absorption (isotonic).

So why does Gatorade use sugar? Since I don’t work for Gatorade I can’t answer for them, but I can tell you that it is an inexpensive carbohydrate and it is very sweet. Inexpensive ingredients increases profits and most people like sweet drinks – a winning combination for Gatorade. However, if your priority is performing your best, you might want to rethink your drink.