How does caffeine help with workouts?

Fact Check: Is Caffeine Good for Your Workouts?

Quite often, it's heard that caffeine can be an energy booster during workouts. While coffee is a popular drink among fitness enthusiasts, is it possible that it's not as effective as it is made out to be?

It's important to understand how effective it is for workouts and, more importantly, what the product is.

What Is Caffeine?

This is a natural stimulant usually found in coffee, tea, and cacao plants. It helps with providing stimulation to the brain and the nervous system, enabling you to stay alert.

It's a product consumed globally and popularly used to stay awake or push off tiredness for a while.

Now, it's a given that it does help one to stay awake during late hours or when a sudden sleep-wave hits. However, is it effective enough during a workout?

How Does Caffeine Help during a Workout?

First, it's important to note that if you're extremely weary and tired, it's better not to weight train than to have coffee to stay awake and hit the weights. If you want to workout, you should be well-rested, not extremely tired, and your muscles aren't sore.

Now, assuming you're rested and able to workout and you've consumed it, it can work as a stimulant.

Usually, consuming it has shown the following effects in the gym:

Increases power and muscle endurance
Reduces the rate of fatigue
Improves focus and alertness
Aims at burning stored fat for fuel instead of glycogen

Besides, it can also be the driving power behind anaerobic and sprint performance among athletes.

However, you do not necessarily need to consume coffee to have caffeine in your system. There are other ways to have the product in your system. The following are primarily used apart from coffee before a workout session.

Green tea
Energy drinks
Pre-workout powders

Now, consuming coffee doesn't only have effects during a workout. There are other benefits to consuming coffee.

Health Benefits

While consuming coffee can boost energy during a workout session, there are other benefits of having coffee.

Boosts energy level during the day
Keeps tiredness away during working hours
Focused on promoting heart health
Allows you to manage weight efficiently

Bottom Line

There is no reason why you should altogether avoid caffeine before a workout. Black coffee is often more suitable as a pre-workout, especially for beginners than pre-workout powders.

This is because powders have a larger caffeine content than coffee. During the initial days, you'll feel jittery during the workout because of it. But it eases with time.

Now, there comes a time when your body will get too used to it because of continuous consumption. What you need to do here is take some time off it. If your body gets too used to the product, the overall effects won't be noticed during a workout or otherwise. At that point, it'll act like any other beverage.

It's crucial to ensure your body doesn't get too used to it that it stops working as an energy booster.

Edited by Piyush Bisht