Originally Posted by Layne

I see that alot of you are currently taking ECA stacks before your workouts. May I suggest that you ditch anything containing aspirin (when taken pre workout) let me explain.

When you workout your body sends signals (i.e. releases hormones) which "tell" your cells that damage has occurred. Many of these hormones work by attatching to a receptor and then starting a signal cascade which activates "local messengers" and "secondary" hormones (i.e. prostoglandins and cAMP).
One group of local messengers are called prostoglandins. Prostoglandins are inflamitory hormones which signal the cell that the tissue has been damaged and to begin synthesizing protein. In the case of muscle tissue... lifting causes and inflammatory response to the tissue damage done by lifting. This causes prostoglandins to be synthesized and these prostoglandins continue the messege cascade, "relaying" the message to the nucleus to start DNA transcription, and thus protein synthesis. This is a good thing... it is one of the things that makes us grow.

Now a little about how prostoglandins are synthesized. They are synthesized from an essential fatty acid called Arachnidonic acid. It is called essential because your body cannot produce it from scratch. Most of the arachnidonic acid is made by converting your dietary intake of Linoleic acid to Arachnidonic acid. Most of this arachnidonic acid is stored your cells phospholipid bilayer. When you workout induced hormone (I don't know the specific hormone) attatches to the cell surface receptor, it causes phospholipase 2 to become active. This enzyme then liberates Arachnidonic acid from the phospholipid bilayer. Cyclooxygenase enzymes (COX1 and COX2) then catalyze the conversion of Arachnidonic acid to the eicosinoids PGG2 (via COX1) and this is then converted to PGH2 via COX2.

Aspirin is a covalent inhibitor of these enzymes. This means it actually attatches to the active site via an actual bond. Once it is attatched the enzyme is said to be "inhibited" and can no longer catalyze the reaction. Thus, prostoglandins cannot be synthesized, and the messege will not be sent to the Nucleus to begin protein synthesis. This has been confirmed in several experiments that show COX inhibitor administration (this includes aspirin, acetominophin, and ibuprofin) knock the exercise induced 76% rise in protein synthesis back down to baseline levels.

Thus my suggestion is to not take ECA within 5 hours of your workout. If you feel you must take a stimulant pre-workout, make sure it does not contain aspirin or any derivitave (white willow bark, et. al)

So lets recap...
Hormone signal -> phospholipase 2 active-> release of AA from membrane-> COX conversion of AA to prostoglandins(this is where aspirin stops the pathway) ->signal for protein synthesis-> protein synthesis

Peace