Health professionals from across the UK gathered today to show their support for Milk it for all it’s worth, a three-year campaign to promote the consumption of milk among young people involved in sport.
The campaign, spearheaded by The Dairy Council, launched last week with Olympic hopefuls, Beth Tweddle, World Champion gymnast and BMX Silver Medallist, Liam Phillips, who urged Britain’s young sports enthusiasts to ’Milk it’.
The conference, which aimed to engage the support of health professionals for the campaign, revealed the latest research into sport nutrition for young people and illustrated how the consumption of milk can benefit them.
Kevin Tipton, Professor of Sport at the University of Stirling highlighted the positive effects of milk on muscles. He said: "Given the potential benefits of milk for young athletes, I fully support this campaign.
"Dairy proteins, in particular whey proteins, seem to be extremely effective for stimulation of anabolism after exercise. Fluid milk ingestion following resistance exercise stimulates muscle protein synthesis, resulting in positive muscle protein balance and muscle growth."
Dr. Keith Tolfrey, Senior Lecturer at Loughborough University identified the physiological differences in young people in the most common fuels used during exercise. He said: "In contrast to the obesity problem in young people, the primary concern for many youth athletes is whether their food energy intake is sufficient in quantity and content to sustain the often very high levels of energy expenditure experienced during training and competing".