Morality of Caffeine before races/workouts

Just to clarify: caffeine constricts blood vessels near the skin surface, sending more blood to the deeper part of the muscles

I believe there are WADA guidelines for caffiene consumption. One cup of joe won't put you anywhere near them.

You know spikes make you faster, right? You probably notice a clear improvement when wearing spikes, do you consider them cheating? What about water...drinking water has a TON of internal benefits. You should probably avoid anything that makes you faster!

Or you could just stay within the rules of your sport like everyone else. Your call.

I think this link covers the matter pretty thoroughly:

http://pics.livejournal.com/twoflower/pic/00023gph/g6

If you had actually read my post you would have seen that I know one cup of coffee is way less than what is banned. I was talking about PRs, improvement, and whether I'm cheating against myself. Also you spelled caffeine wrong.

It is highly immoral. I recommend you discuss it with your priest during Weekly Confessional. He'll probably recommend doing the rosary and saying a few Hail Marys as penance.

Man, I guess I'm out of touch, but it would be great if people here could have a real discussion instead of resorting immediately to ridicule. Not all issues are so clear cut, and sometimes it can actually be valuable to think for 2 seconds and examine things before spouting off. Letsrun really sucks.

I did think for 2 seconds. That's how long it took me to figure out the answer to your question and present it in a way that I hoped would elucidate the situation for you.

People are ridiculing you because you're being ridiculous. Caffeine is such a normal part of life that it's like you're worried about the benefits of iron in oatmeal or something.

But anyway the huge WADA limit doesn't even make sense, because there's no evidence that you get a stronger performance-enhancing effect by having more than ~200-400 mg anyway.

It is okay unless you go to BYU. Honestly, though, it helps to use it, and it is totally legal. Just like staying well hydrated, or eating food. If you are a troll, you are a good one.

Other people put it more rudely, but they're right.

How are you cheating yourself? You could do all sorts of things to handicap your running or not take advantage of things that would benefit you, like taking additional carbs in a marathon, but what would that prove?

You are still the one doing the running and you are following the rules. Drinking coffee is just not that much of a benefit, and certainly no more of a benefit that drinking Gatorade during a marathon or being properly hydrated before a long race.

Bottom line - don't sweat it. Scrupulosity about one cup of coffee is just not necessary.

did you really just link us to livejournal? what is this 2003?

Perhaps a concern to have is to make sure you do not develop a mental crutch where you will psych yourself out of doing well in a race or workout if you don't have the caffeine first. In terms of cheating, if you are using an amount within the rules you are not cheating or cheating yourself. You are putting yourself in the best place to perform just as you would by eating well, sleeping, etc. As you say for you running is about improving internally,if the amount of caffeine is a constant it should not alter whether you are improving as it is not varying and thus not causing one result to be different than another. If you only had it one third of the time for races and those were the outliers, then I could see an internal issue.

If everyone has access to it then it is not cheating.

I love coffee. Coffee in my belly!

What's the morality of wearing better shoes? Isn't that an unfair advantage over poor people?

I don't think drinking caffeine before running is any more immoral than eating, sleeping, taking my legit asthma medication, putting on my favorite shoes... it's just part of life. it's a basic chemical contained in foods/drinks that are a part of normal life. go for it.

Vince S. wrote:

It is highly immoral. I recommend you discuss it with your priest during Weekly Confessional. He'll probably recommend doing the rosary and saying a few Hail Marys as penance.

Agree. It is immorality and sinful behavior. Sure you are cheating yourself, if you think otherwise you are deluding yourself. However the real immorality has to do with all of the loved ones in your life that you are hurting. Caffeine consumption ruins families, shatters dreams and violates god's principals.

Here's something to think about. Although coffee contains caffeine, coffee is, as a matter of fact, not caffeine.

Caffeine provides a well-known ergogenic benefit. This has been well studied by scientists, and it's dosage is limited by organizations such as the NCAA and the IAAF.

However, slightly less well known to the ignorant masses, despite the fact that coffee contains caffeine, coffee does not provide the well known benefits that caffeine does. Any perceived benefit is merely a placebo effect.

So if the question is simply one of morality, there is nothing morally wrong with drinking a beverage that does not in physical fact provide any known ergogenic benefit, even if the drinker does it for the wrong reasons.