In my other life as a classical-theater actor, I've occasionally struggled with vocal strain in performance.  At a cocktail party once, I asked a doctor acquaintance about the problem and was told I could take about 15 ibuprofen tablets a day with no ill effects, and that it would clear the problem up. 

So I did.  Throughout the day during the run of HAMLET, in which I played the very loquacious title role, every couple of hours, I would pop a few Advil or Motrin or Von's brand tablets, downing those suckers like M&M's.  I got through the run of the show without too much trouble.  The effects of the pills may have been psychosomatic, but my voice seemed to have held up reasonably well through all my histrionic ranting and raving. 

There was something admittedly self-destructive, or at least slightly reckless, about popping all those pills.  Everyone told me my kidneys would fall out like bricks from a crumbling wall, but I thought, hey, it's for ART, people, and manned up and popped my candy. 

I've been a pretty big NSAID (Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory...er...Drug?  Device?  Diddly-do?  Regardless, ibuprofen is one) fan throughout my athletic history, popping them before events in hopes that my joints or back or god knows what else wouldn't swell up like so many angry balloons as a result of my efforts. 

But new evidence suggests that that may be not only ineffective but actually counterproductive, causing the very problems that athletes are trying to prevent.  Starting a few years ago, a researcher named David Neiman became interested in the effects of NSAIDS on endurance runners:

Those runners who’d popped over-the-counter ibuprofen pills before and during the race displayed significantly more inflammation and other markers of high immune system response afterward than the runners who hadn’t taken anti-inflammatories. The ibuprofen users also showed signs of mild kidney impairment and, both before and after the race, of low-level endotoxemia, a condition in which bacteria leak from the colon into the bloodstream.

Apparently, I'm not alone in thinking that ibuprofen helps prevent pain:


One of the most common reasons cited by the triathletes in Brazil was "pain prevention." Similarly, when the Western States runners were polled, most told the researchers that "they thought ibuprofen would get them through the pain and discomfort of the race," Nieman says, "and would prevent soreness afterward." But the latest research into the physiological effects of ibuprofen and other NSAIDs suggests that the drugs in fact, have the opposite effect.

So:  new rule folks:  take it easy on that "Vitamin I," as some athletes call it.  Go ahead and take it if you've got acute pain or inflammation--it's still effective in those cases--but don't take the stuff preventitively, cuz it just don't work.

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Hey look, everyone!  Another vid from the ever-innovative Nick Tumminello, this time on core training: