Testing Caffeine

Caffeine is a naturally occurring substance that has been used by endurance athletes for years because it helps you to stay alert and it improves endurance. It usually isn’t harmful but it does have side effects and is banned (in high doses) by many sports organizations. It is the most common drug and can be found in drinks such as coffee, tea, energy drings and soft drinks. It can also be found in foods such as chocolate, energy gels and caffeine pills. 

We decided to run a test using a heavily caffeinated energy gel.

The test was separated into two parts, one without the caffeine and one with the caffeine. It was done at the Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre outdoor pool.



The ourdoor pool at MSAC

 

I completed this set of sprints while my friend timed and filmed me. 

1)      5x 50m max freestyle with 50m recovery in-between, a 500m warm up and a 200m cool down wearing a blueseventy racing suit. Drinking water

Lunch – 1x egg, mayo and lettuce sandwich and 1x diet coke with a few hot chips

The caffeinated gel
used in the test

2)      5x50m max freestyle with 50m recovery in-between, a 500m warm up and a 200m cool down wearing a blueseventy sacing suit. Drinking water and consumed a gel prior to the max 50’s.

 Below are the times recorded with the adverage time for each test:

 

	Test 1(sec)	Test 2(sec)
1	29.8	31.3
2	31.8	31.5
3	31.2	33.1
4	31.8	32.4
5	32.4	31.9
Adv	31.4	32.04

When I got home, I reflected on how I felt physically and mentally before, during and after both the tests.

Test 1:

Before: My muscles felt tired from training beforehand but nothing too bad. I felt pretty good in the water but I could feel my muscles were tired before I started.

During: I was getting good grip on the water but my legs were going numb after 25m of max effort due to the lactic acid. I felt consistent even though I had to try 2x harder every 50m.

After: My muscles were quite tired after, I could feel the lactic acid coursing through my muscles. I felt better after my short cool down

Test 2:

Before: My muscles were very tires and even more stiff than before (obviously). I felt full from lunch.

During: After the gel, I felt really sick. After every 50m, I thought I was going to vomit and I felt I needed to go to the toilet often. My eyesight went a little fuzzy after the 3^rd 50m. I kept burping as well. I didn’t feel my usual grip on the water. I couldn’t really feel my arms and my legs felt numb after 15m max on each 50m.

After: I had a huge headache, I needed to go to the toilet often, my stomach felt all weird and I often had hits of vertigo and had some blackouts later in the afternoon

Here is a short film about the results and how the day went....