If you thought protein shake was the only effective beverage for workouts, you are totally missing out on coffee. Coffee is a globally-renowned drink with numerous surprising benefits to human health, which is all because of the psychoactive substance within it; caffeine. This is the very thing that gives us the jolt we need to get out of bed and more.
Caffeine is a hit among fitness geeks as it is a stimulant that’s chockful of antioxidants which makes it the most preferable pre-workout drink around, as long as you keep away from the cream and sugar as well as drink the proper daily proportion.
Here’s how coffee enhances your workouts:
1. It Helps Burn Fat
Plenty of thermogenic supplements consist of caffeine, which as we talked about earlier, is a stimulant, but it isn’t the only one. Other coffee stimulants include theobromine and chlorogenic acid, which boost the effectiveness of one’s exercises.
These stimulants help boost your body’s metabolism by enhancing your adrenaline levels, which thereby sends the fat from your fatty tissues right into your bloodstream. This results in the loss of fat.
2. Improves Circulation
Japanese researchers have found that those who drank five ounces of regular coffee over a 75-minute period can get a 30% boost in their blood flow than those who drank decaf. And blood circulation means improved oxygenation of your tissues, which thus improves exercise performance.
3. Increases Dopamine Levels
Consuming caffeine can actually help make working out so enjoyable. This is because of a ‘feel-good chemical’ known as dopamine, which is a neurotransmitter that creates a pleasurable sensation within us.
Just drinking a cup or two before you head out to the gym will prevent it from making it feel like a drag. In other words, you’ll feel mighty happy and motivated before you start working out.
4. Boosts Your Physical Performance
Getting the best results out of our workout sessions just feels like a pipedream, most simply because of sheer laziness. That’s why coffee helps fight off such detriments by releasing fatty acids into our bloodstream.
The acids are then converted into energy by our cells, which then increases our workout performance. This means that you’ll be able to contribute those extra 15 minutes on the treadmill that you weren’t able to do before.
5. Reduces Pain
One of the many wonders of coffee is that it’s able to alleviate that nasty pain that we accumulate upon finishing up our intense exercise routines. According to research provided by the University of Georgia and the University of Illinois, consuming about two to three cups of coffee an hour before a half-hour long workout can get reduce pre and post workout muscle pain.
The research provided by the University of Georgia found that two cups of coffee before training reduces post-workout muscle soreness by about 48%. Other muscle soreness-related research found that Aleve relieved only 30% of post-workout pain and that aspirin relieved only 25% of the pain. So if you want some these types of perks to help you with your workouts, we suggest buying yourself a good coffee machine for yourself. Fortunately, we took the liberty of putting up a page of coffee machines comparison to help you decide which one is right for you.