Many of us are slaves to our morning ritual of caffeine consumption, but if you want the most out of your coffee or tea, you're gonna have to be a whole lot more strategic than just stumbling out of bed and reaching for the kettle, says the latest episode of AsapSCIENCE, above. The internal body clock we're trying to rejig when we grab a coffee is our circadian rhythm, and this determines how sleepy or alert we are during the day by releasing the stress hormone, cortisol. And, rather conveniently, our bodies automatically release a burst of cortisol at some point between 8 and 9am.
So what happens when you add caffeine to the mix? Well, according to the video above, if you consume caffeine at the same time as when you're hitting your peak cortisol level - e.g. between 8 and 9am - you're not only diminishing the effects of the caffeine, you're also helping your body to build up a tolerance to it. "Overall that means you get less of a buzz, and need even more to stay away in the future," says AsapSCIENCE.
To get the most out of your coffee, you need to be timing your consumption of it with your cortisol dips, which happen pretty soon after the peaks. Along with 8-9am, other peak times throughout the day are between noon and 1 pm, and between 5:30 and 6:30 pm, so aim for at least half an hour after that. In the morning, that means holding off till between 9:30 am and 11:30 am.
But what about if you're waking up super early, or going to bed super late? There's another strategy for both of these situations, and I'll let the latest episode of AsapSCIENCE above explain that one to you while I grab my first coffee for the day. It's 10:30am, I've held out long enough!