Caveat: the results were found in subjects who were riding 12-15 hours per week and were given the equivalent of 5 cups of joe. That might be Petey after 3 teas on a Friday - but it ain't most of us.
Thanks to Barry for pointing me to the handy general VN index of cycling nutrition columns:
"With the ingestion of both caffeine and carbohydrate, the overall amount of glycogen stored in the muscle for the 4-hour period was 60-percent higher than with carbohydrate alone..."
It doesn't say anything about caffeine alone. We'd probably have to have a lot of sugar in our Moka House Americanos for this to apply to us, and that would be bad for our image, as a stylish cyclist should drink his coffee black and unsweetened.
We have had this discussion before on the forum but I was unaware of the dose used in the quoted study.
Until further studies are done it looks like the ideal coffee consumption is 2 cups pre ride (lots of data on this - "you are crazy if you don't do it" kind of data) and 5 cups after. I'll take mine with a pickle juice chaser.
Eric ( the original Eric #7)
Rolf wrote:a recent VeloNews article looks at some published evidence that caffeine enhances glycogen uptake during recovery
Sigh. This is just another feeble excuse from the coffee world to justify a terrible habit! Anti-oxidants, glycogen uptake, what outlandish claims will they make about the brown death next?
That might be Petey after 3 teas on a Friday - but it ain't most of us.
