Over the counter pain relievers increase muscle mass/stren..

It's recently been reported by scientists at Ball State University
that Ibuprofen or acetaminophen in long-term resistance training
increases muscle mass and strength. This will be of great interest to
anyone seeking better workouts, although the research was conducted in
older adults.

It seems that taking daily recommended dosages of ibuprofen and
acetaminophen caused a substantially greater increase over placebo in
the amount of quadriceps muscle mass and muscle strength gained during
three months of regular weight lifting. Dr. Chad Carroll, a
postdoctoral fellow working with Dr. Todd Trappe at the Human
Performance Laboratory at Ball State University reported these study
results at "Experimental Biology 2008" in San Diego on April 6th.

Thirty-six men and women, between 60 and 78 years of age (average age
65), were randomly assigned to daily dosages of either ibuprofen (such
as that in Advil), acetaminophen (such as that in Tylenol), or a
placebo. The dosages were identical to those recommended by the
manufacturers and were selected to most closely mimic what chronic
users of these medicines were likely to be taking. Neither the
volunteers nor the scientists knew who was receiving which treatment
until the end of the study.

The weight training consisted of 15-20 minute sessions conducted in
the Human Performance Laboratory three times per week. The researchers
were surprised to find that the groups using either ibuprofen or
acetaminophen did even better than the normal, expected increases from
these workouts. The chronic consumption of ibuprofen or acetaminophen
during resistance training appears to have induced intramuscular
changes that enhance the metabolic response to resistance exercise,
allowing the body to add substantially more new protein to muscle.

The amount of change was measured in quadricep muscles using Magnetic
Resonance Imaging (MRI), the gold standard for determining muscle
mass.

Dave

Full text article above extracted from http://shamvswham.blogspot.com/

Tom Anderson writes:

> On Mon, 7 Apr 2008, Dave wrote:
>
>> It's recently been reported by scientists at Ball State University
>> that Ibuprofen or acetaminophen in long-term resistance training
>> increases muscle mass and strength.
>
> Well, dash it all. Last study i read said the exact opposite.
>
>
>> Thirty-six men and women, between 60 and 78 years of age (average age
>> 65),
>
> Aha - elderlies. That may be it.

An obvious mechanism is that they hurt less and so worked harder. I
wonder if the study attempted to control for that.

--
Jim Janney