Can You Fuel a Marathon with Coffee? Join Pure Physio in Half-Marathon Training!

If you’ve ever been lucky enough to walk through the Pure Physio clinic, you’ll be aware that there’s no mystery surrounding our love of coffee.

Coffee is well loved throughout the entire team, and it’s not uncommon to hear statements like “I’m only running if there’s a coffee involved!” echoing through the treatment rooms.

In light of this addiction (and the fact we’re based in Melbourne, a Mecca of sorts for coffee connoisseurs) we thought we’d better have a closer look into the impact coffee can have on a training plan.

Good news. Science supports the use of caffeine in improving physical performance.

The perks of percolating before a run:

• Caffeine reduces the feeling of your perceived exertion – so essentially you can run faster than you think!
• Caffeine can improve mental alertness and concentration, by increasing the number of endorphins within the brain. This enables you to train at higher intensity for a longer time.
• Caffeine increases the use of fatty acids, which in turn improves the speed at which your body is able to convert fat to energy to draw on during training.

Most importantly, caffeine has been linked to performance improvements of up to 12%

This week’s training program:

So relax and enjoy a cup of coffee before you hit the track this week, it’s helping with your preparation!

• Tuesday, March 15th Fatlek/Interval
  Warm up x 10 mins (2km), 5 x 3 mins tempo (90 second intervals)
  Cool down (3km) = 8km

• Thursday, March 17th Long Run
  Easy 8km jog

• Saturday, March 19th Fartlek/Interval
  Warm up x 10 mins (2km), 3 x 5 mins (2 mins walk), 4 x 30 seconds fast jog
  Cool down  (2km) = 8km

• Sunday, March 20th Long Run
  12km

Week total: 36km

That’s it for this week. Remember to check back regularly for more as the weeks progress and we count down to the big event!

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