sports drink history 
The unique origin of sports drinks dates back to the summer of 1965, when a University of Florida Gator's assistant football coach asked a team of university physicians led by Dr. Robert Cade to determine why the heat was affecting so many of their athletes. Way back in 1909 James E. Sullivan, the Head honcho at the US Amateur Athletic Union, advised that athletes “Don’t get in to the habit of drinking and eating in a marathon race; some prominent runners do, but it is not beneficial”.Sitting here just over a century later, it’s difficult not to have a bit of a laugh at this but, remarkably, it’s fair to say that his sweeping statement was the prevailing wisdom at the time. ‘Nil by mouth’ was considered to be the best approach for athletes during training and competition.In these (somewhat) more enlightened times, we take it for granted that consuming specific nutrients before, during and after exercise can boost performance and recovery. We also have a huge range of purpose made sports nutrition products at our fingertips to deliver those nutrients (some of which are of dubious value I should add).A combination of knowledge and the availability of convenient (and portable) products is a major advantage to modern athletes. But the industry we now take for granted had quite interesting beginning,‘Glucozade’ (shortened to the catchier “Lucozade’ pretty early on) can justifiably lay claim to being the earliest traceable ancestor of the multi-billion dollar sports drink industry as it launched in 1927.  It was devised by a chemist called William Owen as a way of delivering quick, digestible energy and fluids to anyone made sick by a host of common illnesses.