How Much Caffeine Do We Actually Need for
Performance? (NEW STUDY)
Caffeine, the world’s most widely used stimulant. And arguably the most crucial element in all
stimulant-based pre-workout supplements for its ergogenic, performance-enhancing effects. But how much caffeine do we actually need? When we consider that some pre-workouts have
caffeine dosages of more than half of the recommended maximum of 500 milligrams, we
have to wonder if such a high dose is even warranted. Well, perhaps a newly published research might
help shed some light on this question: at what dose, if any, can we expect to experience
caffeine’s exercise performance benefits? In this new study by Grgic et al, 28 resistance
trained men were tested in four different areas: Upper-body strength, lower-body strength,
upper-body endurance, and lower-body endurance. They were done via a one-rep max test for
strength and with as many reps possible at 60%1RM for endurance. Five difference experimental trials were performed,
three of which tested the effects of three different caffeine doses: 2, 4, and 6 milligrams
per kilogram of bodyweight one hour before training.
For the average 80-kilogram individual, that’s
160, 320, and 480 milligrams of caffeine respectively. The remaining two experiments were controls,
one with and one without a placebo. Now for the fun part, the results:
Improvements were indeed seen with caffeine, but not in all tests. In terms of strength, upper body strength
needed the higher dosages of 4 and 6 milligrams per kilogram to see statistically meaningful
benefits. But even with those higher doses, the bench
press maxes only went from about 106 kilos in the control to roughly 108 kilos in the
higher caffeine dosages. That maybe worthwhile for some, like strength
athletes pushing their limits, but it isn’t much for most others. More importantly, this was only in comparison
to the NO placebo trial. Against an actual placebo, all three doses
did not have a statistically significant benefit. Lower body strength, on the other hand, did
have moderate improvements, but it’s a bit reversed.
In this case, ONLY the 2-milligram dose observed
statistically significant improvements, increasing squat 1RM to 132.2 kilos versus BOTH control
trials at 129 kilos. A 3+ kilo 1RM increase is definitely better,
although not mind-blowing. Plus, since the 4 and 6 milligram dosages
did nothing, this suggest having TOO much caffeine might potentially blunt strength
benefits. Now, for endurance, it’s a bit of a mixed
bag. For upper body muscle endurance, caffeine
did… pretty much nothing. All five trials hovered around 20.5 to 21
reps in the 60%1RM bench press. The only place we see a much clearer and meaningful
caffeine benefit is with lower body endurance. The no placebo and placebo trials observed
21.7 and 21.1 reps respectively in the 60%1RM squat. Although there were no statistical differences
for the three caffeine trials, they all set about 4 to 5 reps above the controls, with
25 to 26 reps.
But since they did not see any difference
between the three trials, this suggests that having a low caffeine dose is enough to exhibit
lower body endurance benefits and more won’t do you better. So now taking all of this great data into
consideration, what does it mean for you? First, we gotta point out again that this
study was done in resistance trained men, which luckily should apply to the majority
of you following this channel. But generalization of the findings outside
of this population wouldn’t be rational. With that being said, when it comes to caffeine’s
performance benefits, it might not be something worthwhile for strength. Or at least don’t get your hopes up thinking
that it will boost your 1RM any more than a few percentage points. Endurance is a bit trickier. To keep things simple, let’s just say that
if it’s leg day, then yes, it might be worth taking. And if you do choose to use it for either
performance reasons, then taking 2 milligrams per kilogram of bodyweight is all you need.
Now one limitation of this study I do wanna
point is the matter of caffeine tolerance. The majority of participants were low habitual
caffeine users, consuming no more than 100 milligrams of caffeine per day. Some, if not most of us, generally take in
more. And the lowest dose of this study was also
higher than 100 milligrams. It’s likely that the higher caffeine dose
than the subjects were used to might explain the effects they observed, but not entirely. Whether we’ll see benefits in users with
habitually higher intakes is up in the air. Maybe something like cycling your caffeine
if you’re a high-caffeine user might be a good idea. But that’s about it. Caffeine might help but you certainly don’t
need too much of it.
If you wanna check out the study yourself,
I’ll link it in the description. Let me know about your caffeine experiences
in the comments below. Has it helped you and if so, how much do you
take? If you enjoyed this video, don’t forget
to give it an ergogenic thumbs up and share it with your caffeine-loving friends. As always, thank you for watching and GET
YOUR PROTEIN!.
