What Happens To Your Body When You Dry Scoop Pre-Workout?
The world of fitness is a complex one. Once you decide to finally hit the gym you've been avoiding for months (ahem, or years) you can sometimes end up falling deep into a rabbit hole of trying to figure out the right and wrong ways to work out. As with anything these days, the internet is filled with conflicting heated opinions that can leave you perplexed.
In the fitness world more than any other, you often see trends and hacks going viral, only to be denounced shortly thereafter with claims that they're actually super harmful to your body. It's a dangerous rabbit hole. It can be harmful to catch on to what your favorite fitness influencers are harping on about, as you might actually either be hurting your progress or even worse — hurting your body. It's important to be wary of fitness trends, and that's definitely the case when it comes to the new viral method of getting your pre-gym energy in ...
Doctors claim dry scooping pre-workout can be dangerous
As with any hobby, there are levels of knowledge and expertise. The average person might not even know about pre-workouts, let alone bother to take them. But when it comes to any gym-regular, a pre-workout is a must-have step. Pre-workout supplements contain a combination of ingredients (usually including caffeine) that serve the purpose of giving your body extra energy to get you through a workout as well as helping your muscles recover (via Healthline).
Pre-workouts typically come in a powdered form, and you are recommended to add a scoop or two to a bottle of water. This is why people were perplexed when a fitness trend went viral on TikTok where people would simply put the dry scoop of pre-workout directly into their mouths instead of dissolving it in water first (via Men's Health). Countless fitness influencers can be seen doing this, and it's often followed with a facial expression similar to that of someone taking a shot.
While the trend spreads wider and wider, doctors have chimed in. The Cleveland Clinic published an article condemning it, and explaining that dry scooping "may mislead millions of impressionable minors into improper use of pre-workout, which could lead to respiratory or cardiovascular distress and/or death." This method can induce the risk of choking (it's essentially similar to the cinnamon challenge which was painful enough), and it can also lead to overstimulation by inhaling a huge dose of caffeine in one go.