Effect of Caffeine on reduction of Muscle pain and Immunological reaction during Eccentric exercise in hot environment

Journal of Exercise Nutrition & Biochemistry 2009;13(4):273-282.

Abstract

The purpose of this research was to determine the effect of caffeine on alleviating muscular pain and immunological reaction in blood induced by repeated eccentric contraction. For this, 26 male and female college students with no prior exercise experience who do not habitually consume caffeine(<100 mg·day-1) classified control group(Con-G; male=6, female=6, age=23.17±1.99yrs, height=167.55±4.33 cm, body weight=61.71±6.67 kg, BMI=21.55±3.15 kg·m-2) and the experimental group with 3 mg·kg-1 caffeine ingestion(Caff-G; male=6, female=8, age=21.86±2.03 yrs, height=166.71±5.17 cm, weight=61.35±6.73 kg, BMI=21.68±2.96 kg·m-2). Both groups carried out backward walking at a 85-88 steps per minute rhythm on a treadmill with a ?15% elevation at a speed of 3 km·h-1 for 30 minutes under 32±0.3oC temperature and 33.93±0.53% humidity. The energy consumed by each of the subjects was approximately 5-7.9 kcal·min-1 varying by different physical traits. The results of the experiment showed no significant change in the level of whole body sweating volume in both groups(p=0.814). Although muscular pain in both groups increased significantly 5 minutes after the experiment, muscular pain was observed at a significantly lower rate in the Caff-G than in the Con- G(p=0.019). Furthermore, there was no significant change in RPE between the two groups(p=0.493). All the blood immunological reaction analyzed in this research, showed significant difference by Pre and Post backward walking for 30 min excluding basophil. However, when analyzing the groups, there were not significantly differences between groups. As a result, we derived the conclusion that while the consumption of 3mg·kg-1 of caffeine before exercise in high temperature environments is effective in reducing muscular pain, there are no side effects that deter blood immunological reaction. But a downside of this experiment is that the reason and process for the reduction of muscular pain in the experimental group is still unknown.

Key Words: Caffeine, Hot, Eccentric contraction, Muscle pain, Immunological response