In my daily travels I read through countless blogs, news articles, press releases, and certain articles spark my interested. I ventured over to Swimming World Magazine where I found a press release from the Western Athletic Conference regarding caffeine and its status as an illegal substance in college athletics. The press release focused primarily on one drink (red bull). While I agree that caffeine is a stimulant, I am hard pressed to acknowledge that it has a significant positive (enhancing) effect on athletic performance.
In my opinion, and as a former college athlete, caffeine was how we managed a 5:00am workout followed by two-a-day practices and film study at night along with coordinating a full coarse-load while keeping a respectable grade point average. Second, caffeine has to be one of the most readily accessible drugs for college students; delivered in the form of energy drinks, coffee, soda, chocolate, etc. Further, in a study conducted in 2007 over 51% of college students consume an energy drink more than once per month.
Without going much further, let me point out that I firmly understand that caffeine is a stimulant and I acknowledge that it can/does have performance enhancing qualities with regard to energy levels which could provide certain athletes with an unfair advantage. I also fully understand that caffeine has addictive qualities, and could potentially cause further drug addictions.
Currently, the NCAA limits caffeine blood content to 15 micrograms per mL. It takes 30 to 45 minutes for caffeine’s effects to reach their peak in the average human, and around 3 – 4 hours for half of the caffeine ingested to fully digest. So, if a cup of coffee has 100 milligrams of caffeine (which is typical in an 8 ounce cup of java), you’re blood content level is 18.51 micrograms/mL for the first 2 – 3 hours. This also means that if you have a cup of coffee within that time frame prior to your competition you will most likely positively test for caffeine.
In researching the caffeine contents of various energy drinks and food, here is what I found:
- Coffee = 100 mg (average)
- Red Bull = 80 mg
- 1 ounce of sweet chocolate = 75 – 150 mg
- Monster = 160 mg
- 5 Hour Energy = 136 mg
- 5150 Juice = 500 mg
So, my question to all of you is: Where do we draw the line?
In my personal opinion, I think that caffeine should either be removed from the banned substance list as the frequency of its use is almost immeasurable, or the legal limit of caffeine should be increased to acknowledge the current societal intake of the drug. I think that the NCAA can construct precautionary measures, materials, and limits to help deter student-athletes from abusing the drug.
I would, however, love to hear where you stand on the subject! So, get the comments rolling and let’s debate this issue!
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2 questions: has anyone ever been nailed for a positive caffeine test, and does athletic competition significantly speed up the processing of the caffeine and get it out of your blood faster?
Either way, there are plenty of instances where athletes are not allowed to use certain substances that the general population is. Not sure why caffeine is a special case, besides it’s proliferation, I guess. I’d maybe be an advocate for raising the limit. And perhaps making a special range where athletes get a warning, and are disqualified only from the next meet, or a very short suspension, or from events at the meet where a positive test was conducted.
Not sure what the current punishment is, or if it’s something they tend to just overlook, but I can’t imagine someone receiving a 2-year ban from it’s use. Does USA-Swimming ban it too, or just the NCAA?
Allow me to correct myself in this post…1 cup will not yield a restricted amount. However, according to a dietitian and nutritionist that I spoke with today, 3 – 4 cups of coffee could give a significant level of caffeine that would be over that 15mg/L amount.