Phil Hossler, ATC is the certified athletic trainer at East Brunswick High School in East Brunswick, NJ. As a member of four halls of fame, he has been an athletic trainer for over 30 years and has worked with thousands of scholastic athletes. Having worked with and having done research on wrestlers on the high levels, Phil is very familiar with the sport of wrestling and its demands on intelligent weight control and maintenance.
After seeing Michael Phelps' performance in the 2004 Olympics and the subsequent milk commercials, Phil checked into the idea. He has been casually talking to athletes for several years, but recently receiving the Refuel curriculum from www.milkdelivers.org provided the impetus to formalize his efforts. Phil recently included information on the value of post-exercise lowfat chocolate milk in the booklet that he presents to wrestlers and their parents.
Wrestlers are very calorie aware but must also be very recovery and nutrition conscious. The energy value of lowfat chocolate milk and its protein derived muscle regeneration plus 9 essential nutrients was a welcome education for athletes and parents alike. Parents were encouraged to always have that container of cold lowfat chocolate milk waiting at home when the wrestlers got home from practice.
Now, after months of educating athletes, parents and the school administration, Hossler has finally succeeding in getting his Refuel with Chocolate Milk program off the ground. With help from his milk processor, Consolidated Dairies, he now sells lowfat chocolate milk to his athletes out of the training room to drink after workouts, after school practice and games, and sales have been going briskly. But it took a lot of perseverance! He started initially by researching vended milk and shelf-stable milk, but he ran into some roadblocks.Together with the school principal, they eventually worked out an arrangement for his student trainers to sell milk with the proceeds going to the booster club to purchase supplies and clothing. Once the details were formalized, Phil talked with his school foodservice director and established a relationship with the school’s milk processor to purchase crates of milk. To help kick off the program, the processor donated the first delivery! So, after months of effort and dozens of phone calls, Phil finally figured out a way to get exactly what his athletes need—lowfat chocolate milk to refuel and recover.
Not only have his monumental efforts for his athletes paid off, but Phil has also found himself involved in a blog where he continues to spread the message of nutrition and recovery. Phil drives home the true message of chocolate milk through his efforts in his school and online. He believes in chocolate milk and so do his athletes!
