Are Energy Drinks Safe?
There is no shortage of products available that were designed to not only help you get through your workouts, but to enhance them as well. There’s creatine, nitric oxide supplements, ephedra, this powder, that pill, etc. One group of products that has taken the world by storm, however, are energy drinks.
Energy drinks are drinks which can be purchased virtually anywhere, in most convenience stores, drug stores, super markets, etc. Some are carbonated, some are not. Some claim to have vitamins, or supplements to aid your workout recovery, and others don’t. One thing they all have in common, is that they are stimulants.
Caffeine is the primary stimulant in most all energy drinks, and lots of it. It has been recognized throughout the medical community that a normally healthy adult can ingest roughly up to 400 mg of caffeine per day. To put this in perspective, a Red Bull energy drink contains 148 grams of caffeine coupled with a staggering 37 grams of sugar. To call it a stimulant, would be a vast understatement. This is a pretty typical ingredient profile amongst energy drinks, but the real question is, are they safe?
Energy drinks are a big business. So much so that sales are expected to pass over 21 million dollars in the year 2017. They are obviously popular, but how safe are they? In moderation, they can be fine, however, certain drinks, such as a 16 ounce beverage called Bang, contains 350 mg of caffeine. Take a couple of these and you are putting your heart and neurological health in jeopardy. Problems such as an irregular heartbeat, and even seizures have been linked with excessive intake of energy drinks. Most all of the energy drinks have a huge amount of sugar and caffeine, as I mentioned, but another primary ingredient they contain is taurine, and once taurine is mixed with caffeine, they amplify the effect of the other.
Coffee can have a massive amount of caffeine as well. All it takes is adding a few shots of espresso to any coffee drink and you’ve made it into quite a high octane beverage. Those too, sans the sugar and taurine, are not much safer than energy drinks if consumed on a regular basis, as too much caffeine can overload the electrical process in the heart, especially if whomever consumed it is engaged in physical activities or any other type of stress.
Too much sugar is simply bad for our health. Too much of most anything can pose potential problems, for that matter, but cognitively ingesting a whopping amount of stimulants and sugar just to feel energized doesn’t make much sense. If one were to eat, sleep, and workout properly, there would be no need for these products. If you do choose to consume energy drinks, do so in moderation and use it as a supplement for your workouts, as opposed to a replacement for sound nutrition and sleep, and you’ll be that much further ahead.
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Andy
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