Sports nutrition: the benefits and harms of honey, myths and reality.

Honey is a highly nutritious natural product with an incredible number of beneficial properties. Refers to the type of “fast” carbohydrates, which are an essential component of sports nutrition. In combination with protein products, it promotes rapid recovery of strength and helps maintain optimal glucose levels during strength exercises. If you are thinking about what food helps you gain muscle mass, pay attention to bee products.

What are the beneficial properties of honey for athletes?

The beneficial properties of a bee product for athletes are based on its component composition. Honey includes an amino acid series that is necessary for muscle fibers. The presence of simple and complex carbohydrates, proteins, vitamins and microelements includes nectar in the group of mandatory products when playing sports. Benefit:

absence of a sharp jump in blood glucose and reduced release of insulin compared to sugar;
provision of ready reserves (glycogen) for energy output;
strengthening immune defense, aiding recovery after exercise;
the presence of a complex of amino acids in an easily digestible form, which goes towards building muscles;
supply of simple carbohydrates for quick energy;
stimulating progress in strength exercises;
normalization of metabolism, saturation with vitamins and minerals;
cleansing the body of free radicals, waste, toxins;
calming the nervous system, which is required for restorative sleep;
reducing “bad” cholesterol in the blood, the risk of hypertension, diabetes, heart disease, obesity;
destructive effect on fungi, bacteria, elimination of inflammation.

Honey in sports is valued for improving appearance, athletic performance, and also for its overall benefits to the body. If you replace sugar with a bee product, you will experience weight loss.

Honey in sports before training

To increase energy before exercise, it is recommended to consume carbohydrates. Flower nectar is considered an excellent supplier due to the presence of fructose, glucose, and maltose. Advantages of flower nectar:

easy and quick absorption (in 30–60 minutes);
increasing endurance when consumed before exercise;
the proportion of carbohydrates per 100 g is 70–80 g, no fat;
avoiding hypoglycemia (sharp drop in blood sugar), which causes fainting during exercise.

Athletes are recommended to consume 1 g of product per 1 kg of body weight 1 hour before the start of exercise. As you exercise, nutrients will gradually enter your bloodstream. To speed up absorption, it is better to make warm honey water.

Honey in sports after training

Fitness takes a lot of energy and strength, so the body needs recovery after exercise. Carbohydrate foods are suitable for this, which is where natural sweetness belongs. Advantages:

filling gaps in energy metabolism, reducing catabolic processes;
saturation with easily digestible amino acids, which are used for high-quality restoration and construction of muscle fibers;
removal of radicals and breakdown products thanks to antioxidants.

It is recommended to consume honey after training within half an hour, 1 g per 1 kg of body weight. Taking nectar together with protein products (meat, cottage cheese, egg whites, protein) will speed up recovery.

How and when is it better for a bodybuilder to take honey?

Nutritionists offer several ways for weightlifters to take honey. It can be eaten an hour before the start of training, which will contribute to the influx of a large amount of energy, and the athlete will not feel tired for a long time.

After all, carbohydrates are the main source of energy for our body. The second way to consume honey is after a workout. In this case, the athlete’s energy reserves will quickly be replenished (due to the closure of the protein-carbohydrate window), which will help to quickly overcome fatigue and restore strength.

If a bodybuilder has problems sleeping due to long, frequent and exhausting workouts, then honey and milk will again come to his aid, which should be eaten half an hour before bedtime. When taken this way, it will not only provide you with a full, healthy sleep, but will also help your body recover overnight.

This miracle product can be eaten throughout the day with tea or coffee, which can be added instead of sugar. The main thing is not to put honey in too hot water (more than 60° C), because it will lose its healing properties and even become harmful.

I’ll add one more nice quality of honey: despite the fact that it is a very sweet product, it has a low glycemic index (does not stimulate a sharp release of insulin by the pancreas) and does not lead to a sharp increase in blood sugar levels.

You can eat honey in different ways: in its pure form from a spoon, stirring it in liquid (water, black or green tea, milk), and also with cottage cheese. By the way, some believe that honey allows calcium to be better absorbed.

It is interesting that honey is offered to athletes both for gaining weight and for losing (drying) muscles. If you want to lose weight, then after training you should not eat this product so that the body uses glycogen from the muscle depot. After 18.00 it is also better to eat protein foods and complex carbohydrates, which honey does not include.

Alas, dishonest sellers manage to add useless additives to this wonderful product that reduce the beneficial qualities of honey (sugar, starch, flour). Such a mixture will not give anything useful to the athlete. So, don’t be tempted by the low price of this product, find a good, trusted supplier - it’s worth it!

That's it, friends: your desire for achievements in sports is quite compatible with tasty foods, if they are healthy. The only contraindication to consuming honey is an allergy to bee products. - Shall we try?

Do you work out in the gym and want to speed up metabolic processes in your body? And at the same time, quickly cleanse the muscles of lactic acid and compensate for energy costs? Are you looking for a natural solution to help you concentrate better during your workouts and make them more effective? Honey is the perfect energy drink and your assistant in sports!

Is it possible to dry honey?

When drying the body (reducing body fat), a gradual reduction in carbohydrates in the diet is required. Changes in diet and training will allow muscle definition to appear. Athletes are interested in two questions:

Can bee products be dried?
Is it true that honey, when added regularly to the diet, burns fat.

There is no reliable answer to these questions. Flower nectars contain a high content of simple carbohydrates and calories, which is undesirable for drying. However, the bee product definitely provides more benefits than sugar, so it is sometimes used as a replacement.

Knowing what happens to the body when it dries will help determine how the bee product works. Flower nectar activates metabolism and stimulates the release of bile secretion, which is involved in the breakdown of adipose tissue. It is these processes that underlie drying. Vitamins and minerals are used to compensate for nutrients, the amount of which decreases with limited nutrition. Therefore, natural sweetness can not be removed from the diet.

If you decide to leave nectar in your diet, it is better to eat it in the morning on an empty stomach or for breakfast. It is common to take honey water (1 spoon of sweetness per glass). However, you can add honey to your morning meals. In the last weeks of drying, sweet foods are removed completely, as the amount of carbohydrates is minimized.

Which honey is best for gaining muscle mass?

For heavy weight training, dark flower nectars are better suited - buckwheat, chestnut, heather, angelica or eucalyptus. Benefits using the example of buckwheat:

supply of minerals, proteins, iron to the body;
renewal of blood composition;
cleansing blood vessels;
increased hemoglobin in the blood;
stimulation of tissue regeneration abilities.

Eating to build muscle involves increasing the amount of carbohydrates and calories in your diet. Therefore, the bee product is used at this stage. The energy value of dark varieties sometimes reaches 400–415 kcal. The permissible norm is no more than 200 g per day.

Too law-abiding to dope? Choose honey

It doesn’t matter what sport you do, whether you want to achieve results in bodybuilding, weight loss, athletics or weightlifting, swimming, long jumping - the bees will make sure that your refrigerator always has the best assistant in this difficult task.

Why is the product of bee labor so effective? Everything becomes clear when examining the composition of this energy drink created by nature itself. It contains:

Water. Dozens of books have been written about the benefits of drinking water in sports.
Minerals and metals, in particular: zinc, phosphorus, magnesium, copper, calcium and many others.
Carbohydrates and simple sugars.
Amino acids for protein construction and useful enzymes.
Vitamins, in a very wide spectrum.
Organic antibiotics – phytoncides.
"A growth hormone".
Fatty acids and many other beneficial substances.

It is especially worth noting the high energy value and calorie content of honey, which allows us to consider it as an ideal energy product: it is comparable to that of wheat bread, which is two or more times higher than fish oil.

Why not just eat bread then? Of course, everything is very simple. First of all, it's boring. Secondly, honey produced by bees from flower nectar promotes accelerated restoration of strength because it stimulates stem cells, promotes wound healing and inhibits aging, being a natural antioxidant.

Thirdly, it’s delicious. Even despite the saying about the difficulty of finding a friend “to taste and color,” the breadth of varieties of bee products, as well as the menu of dishes and drinks that can be prepared with its participation, will not leave even gourmets indifferent.

Fourthly, honey is absorbed by the body 100%, which almost no other products can boast of.

Fifthly, unlike bread, honey can not only be eaten. In modern medical and sports practice, indirect methods of its use are widespread. For example, anti-cellulite wrap and use for massage after sports injuries.

Sports cocktails with honey

Typically, flower nectar is consumed in its pure form or as an ingredient in sports cocktails. When preparing, nutritious foods containing proteins and carbohydrates are used to provide energy before exercise or recovery after exercise. Common recipes:

Dissolve a large spoon of nectar with 50 ml of warm water. Add 200 ml of freshly squeezed orange juice to the honey solution. The drink is best consumed 30 minutes before physical activity.
Place 100 g of cottage cheese, chopped banana, a tablespoon of oatmeal and honey in a blender. Add 200 ml of milk, beat until smooth, drink 1 hour before physical activity.
Place a tablespoon of bee product, 1 chopped banana and 300 ml of low-fat milk into a blender. Shake the ingredients and drink 30 minutes after training.
Mix a whole chicken egg (raw) and 1 large spoon of flower nectar and ground walnuts. Add 200 ml of kefir, beat until smooth. Have a cocktail after class.
Combine a tablespoon with a glass of warm milk. Drink at night, before going to bed. This will improve sleep, help the body recover, and rest until the next workout.

Honey is an important product for athletes, endowed with beneficial properties due to the content of micronutrients and nutrients. The increased caloric content of flower nectars helps to quickly replenish energy reserves, which increases endurance or athletic performance. When dried, the natural sweetness is used as a sugar substitute.

A drop of tar

The beneficial properties of the amber product are undeniable if you follow moderation and do not overload the pancreas with large doses. In the morning, it is preferable for the body to refuel with a spoonful of porridge with a drop of honey, and not vice versa. During medical treatment, healers advise using no more than 100 grams of the product - 3 tablespoons - per day. Caloric intake – 310 – 320 Kcal. If you do not adhere to physiological doses, you will gain extra pounds, have problems with the pancreas, and risk stage 2 diabetes.

Honey is absolutely contraindicated for allergy sufferers and children under three years of age. There is one concession: you can use acacia honey, which is called “baby honey” - it does not cause unwanted reactions.

Be careful: you may encounter poisonous or “drunken honey” - in the southern regions, bees bring nectar from rhododendrons, which contain a dangerous glucoside - andromedotoxin. Toxic substances are also contained in the pollen of azalea, laurel, and andromeda. Honey based on such nectar causes in a person a state similar to severe intoxication: convulsions, vomiting, dizziness. There is evidence from historians of how “drunken honey” knocked down a legion of Roman soldiers. At the end of the 19th century, cases of poisoning with “drunken honey” were identified in Batumi. When analyzing the composition, it was established that the bees brought nectar from laurel trees. But the bees themselves, feeding on such nectar, feel safe. Experts advise heating honey delivered from the southern regions in a water bath to 60 degrees, the harmful substances will “evaporate.”

We have already refuted the myth about the dangers of heating honey and the ban on consuming a fragrant product with hot water by research by scientists from the Moscow Academy of Veterinary Medicine and folk recipes for decoctions of honey with medicinal herbs. A centuries-old tradition shows that hot honey does not lose its medicinal properties.