Time Dose Relation of Caffeine Ingestion on Muscular Strength and Endurance Performance

Abstract

ABSTRACT Background There have been numerous studies and reviews indicating that caffeine ingested before exercise causes rapid and significant improvement in performance, especially in aerobic capacity. Even though caffeine has a half life of 4 to 6 hours that implies high level of caffeine will be in the blood for up to 3 to 4 hours after ingestion, most studies on exercise performance are at 1 hour after ingestion. Objectives To assess the efficacy of 300 mg of caffeine and placebo ingestion at 1 hour, 1 hour 30 minutes, 2 hours, 2 hours 30 minutes, 3 hours in improvement of isometric muscle strength in human quadriceps muscle, cardiorespiratory endurance and to find that which of the duration produce best result. Materials and methods Experimental study with different subject design. Twenty subjects with equal number of boys and girl (age 20-30 years, weight 60-65 kg) were recruited to participate in the study. They were randomly allocated to experimental and placebo group. Pre- and postquadriceps muscle strength and time to exhaustion at 65% of VO2max was recorded. Results The results showed significant improvement (p < 0.001) in strength and endurance at all five durations in experimental group. Results were significant (p < 0.05) when caffeine and placebo groups were compared. The percentage improvement for strength and endurance was higher at 1st and 2nd hours when compared to 3rd hours duration. Conclusion The effects of caffeine are highest till 2 hours of ingestion after that wean off effects are seen. How to cite this article Sandhu JS, Shenoy S, Dutt I. Time Dose Relation of Caffeine Ingestion on Muscular Strength and Endurance Performance. J Postgrad Med Edu Res 2012; 46(1):19-23.