Does coffee make a difference to exercise?

A new study proves that consuming one cup of coffee before exercise improves peak performance before exercise.

Coventry University researchers recruited 46 amateur cyclists who trained once to three times a week for a year and had them track coffee intake.

And they found that a group of cyclists who drank coffee before cycling the three miles on an exercise bike performed 1.7% better than another group who were given a placebo drink before cycling.

Previous research has found that coffee can boost physical endurance by suppressing pain, reducing fatigue, and improving neuromuscular performance.

However, it wasn't clear if these benefits extend to people who drink coffee on a regular basis, so study author Dr. Neil Clark set out to investigate this.

The team looked at the effect of habitual caffeine intake on the performance of a three-mile cycling trial to better understand the relationship between caffeine and performance.

Participants were asked to complete a coffee consumption questionnaire and were divided into two groups, depending on how much they usually drank.

And people who usually drank one or two cups of coffee per day were placed in the low group, while those who drank four to five cups of coffee were placed in the high group.

Some cyclists were given a cup of coffee, others were given a fake drink, and both had to ride a three-mile bike on an exercise machine an hour later.

And drinking coffee before the experiment improved people's physical performance by 1.7%, regardless of how much coffee the participants usually drank.

Dr. Clark said: "Drinking coffee and providing three mg / kg of caffeine improved the performance of the five-kilometer cycling experience with similar performance observed among low and high caffeine users."

Thus, habitual caffeine consumption did not affect the energy-generating effect of coffee ingestion prior to the five-kilometer cycling experience.

Caffeine consumption was measured against body weight, at 3 mg / kg, equivalent to 200 mg of caffeine for an adult weighing 70 kg.

Researchers say a typical cup of coffee contains between 75 and 100 mg of caffeine.

Dr. Clark explained, "There is an association between caffeine consumption and an increase in performance and endurance, along with a significant decrease in effort during exercise."