Health Food Impostors - Vitamin Water

Vitamin. The word just makes you feel healthy doesn't it? It makes you want to tie those shoe laces extra tight and go bounding out of your front door at 6am in the morning to break in those never worn Reeboks and sweat out that McValue meal you ate last night. It makes you think that any item in the grocery store that displays the word must be good for you and sees you throwing them in your shopping cart faster than Bravo can release another Real Housewife series. But did you know that one of these so called "healthy" products can contain nearly as much sugar as a can of soda, and even more than a slice of chocolate cake?

Yes I'm talking about Vitamin Water. The product that has been heavily marketed as a health drink over the past few years, and marketed so effectively that you see people guzzling them after they hop off the treadmill, consuming them after an hour long spin class, and buying them in bulk at the supermarket to stock in their refrigerators to have on hand as a substitute for those unhealthy sodas. But I'm here to shed some light and advise you that these "healthy drinks" are nothing more than sugary water, and if you do guzzle one after exercise, you have basically derailed all the hard work and effort you have just put into burning those calories.


Vitamin Water is part of the Glaceau Company (owned by Coca-Cola), and in my efforts to find nutritional information on the product from their website, I was directed to their Facebook fan page where there was nothing more than fluffy marketing posts. After some searching I eventually found the information on a beverage distribution webpage. You see Glaceau has a good reason for not having nutritional information on their site, because they know that consumers rarely turn the bottle over and look at what's in the product, and they would hate the public to know their healthy water is about as healthy as sucking on a lollipop.

Lets take a look at the nutrition (or lack of nutrition) facts:

Serving size: 8 fl oz

Servings per container: 2.5

Amount per serving: Calories: 50

Total fat: 0g

Sodium: 0 mg

Total carbohydrates: 13g

Sugar: 13g

Protein: 0g

The above is what you see when you turn the bottle around, and as a consumer you might be forgiven for thinking that 13 grams of sugar isn't that bad... and it's not that bad, but take a look at the amount of servings per container; 2.5. Yep that's right, so you need to almost triple the calories and sugar to get the exact amount of what you are getting in the whole bottle, because who only drinks two fifths of the bottle? That takes the total amount of calories up to 125, and the amount of sugar to a whopping 32.5 grams giving you a big insulin spike and causing your body to hold onto your fat tighter than Aretha holds onto her Cheetos.

How much is 32.5 grams of sugar exactly? It's roughly around 8 teaspoons of sugar. If it sounds like a lot, that's because it is.  Lets put it in even more perspective...

Product                                      Sugar
Fruit Loops                                   16 grams
Twizzlers (4 pieces)                      19 grams
Krispy Kreme Chocolate                21 grams
Kit Kat                                         22 grams
Hershey's Kisses (9 pieces)          24 grams
Chocolate Cake (1 slice)               30 grams
Mountain Dew                              31 grams
Starbucks Tall Frappucino             32 grams
Vitamin Water                             32.5 grams
Coca Cola                                    39 grams
Cinnabon Roll                               55 grams

So not only is Vitamin Water bad for you, its fat for you as well. Consuming one bottle of per day equates to roughly 10 chocolate glazed Krispy Kremes in one week. If that's not enough to make you spit it out, then I don't know what will... oh hang on, yes I do; how about if you drink just one bottle a day, you could be putting on 13 pounds of fat per year? It's true and It will send you down to the tailor to get all those short shorts let out and see you donating that tight Abercrombie t-shirt you bought in winter in preparation of summer to the Good Will donation box.

So what should you drink after exercise? Well, in my opinion you can't beat good old-fashioned mother nature's answer to hydration - water. But I understand that not everyone can stomach the plain and boring taste and some people prefer to throw back something with electrolytes, so go for a low sugar protein shake and add your own fruit, or consume some coconut water. There are a ton of new ready-to-drink coconut waters on the market these days, and they can contain more potassium than a banana and over 10 times the amount of electrolytes than traditional sports energy drinks, but without the nasty chemicals and large amounts of sugar. Now, If you don't want to take my word for it, news is Madonna has invested a reported 1.5 million dollars into new coconut water company Vita-Coco. She has previously brought cowboys hats and the geisha look back into fashion, maybe coconut water is going to be the next big thing?

So if your quest is for healthy living, or simply to lose a few pounds, it's important to know what you are really eating and drinking, and it's a simple as turning the product over and taking a look at the nutrition label. Don't be fooled by health food impostors and don't believe everything you read as being "healthy" or all those hours you spend exercising will be as about pointless as the next season of a Kardashian family reality show.

Healthy Boy x