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7 Surprising Facts About Caffeine From : Murray Carpenter Most of us have an intimate relationship with caffeine. We crave it, love it, and take it every day in coffee, tea and sodas. It feels quite familiar. But as I researched my bookCaffeinated, I quickly learned that America’s favorite drug held surprises at every turn. Here are seven of them: 1) Coke used to have as much caffeine as Red Bull: For starters, consider energy drinks. Red Bull, Rockstar, Monster and other syrupy sweet, caffeinated drinks are suddenly everywhere. But there is really nothing new about them. As I read through the court papers from a 1911 trial pitting the federal government against Coca-Cola over the caffeine it blended into its products, I was surprised to learn that the early formulation for Coke was far more caffeinated than it is today. An eight-ounce serving had 80 milligrams of caffeine. This is the exact size and caffeine content of a modern Red Bull. Put another way, Coca-Cola pioneered the energy drink concept more than a century ago. The first Red Bull was a Coke. 2) Energy drinks still don’t have as much caffeine as Starbucks coffee: And then I ran into another popular misconception — the idea that these new energy drinks are super-caffeinated. Yes, they pack more of a caffeine punch than colas or teas, but rarely as much as coffee. It is hard to buy a coffee at Starbucks with less caffeine than a Red Bull (perhaps a single shot of espresso, or a mere four ounces of coffee). Even the popular 16-ounce Monsters and Rockstars — they supersize the Red Bull concept, doubling the size and the caffeine content — typically have about 160 milligrams of caffeine. That’s half the amount Starbucks estimates for a drip-brewed grandé. 3) We drink less coffee today, per person, than we did in the 1950s: So yes, we are drinking more energy drinks these days, but coffee culture still rules, right? We’ve got a Starbucks on every corner, it seems, and sometimes two, so we must be sipping more joe than ever. But here’s the weird thing — we drink less coffee than we did in 1950, a lot less. American coffee consumption peaked shortly after World War II, and then plummeted. Meanwhile, soft drinks became Americans’ favorite caffeinated beverages. 4) Nonetheless, coffee still accounts for most of our caffeine intake: But even as we chug more gallons of caffeinated sodas than coffee, we get more of our caffeine from coffee. Because the caffeine is more concentrated in coffee, it still provides two-thirds of the caffeine in our diet. Soft drinks come in second, and tea is in third place. 5) Most tea today is iced: And what about that tea, anyway? Again, it’s the source of a lot of misunderstanding. We typically think of tea as something prepared in a cup, with hot water poured over a tea bag, and sipped hot. But that is an archaic notion. So here’s another little-known fact — iced tea now accounts for 85 percent of the tea consumed in the US. This includes not just the sweet tea that lubricates southern living, but also the fast-growing bottled teas, ranging from Brisk and Nestea to the upscale Honest Tea and Tazo brands. 6) It doesn’t take much to get hooked: Even as our preferences have shifted toward bottled sodas and teas, with their lower caffeine concentrations, research has shown that it does not take much caffeine to develop dependence. And here is another caffeinated surprise — as little as 100 milligrams of caffeine daily is enough to get an adult hooked. That’s about five to eight ounces of coffee, two bags of Lipton tea, or three cans of Coke. At this level of caffeine consumption, most people will experience some symptoms of caffeine withdrawal if they quit abruptly. Symptoms can include lethargy, no surprise, but also irritability and, especially, the classic caffeine withdrawal headache. 7) Caffeine is now being marketed as a hangover cure:Though caffeine can actually trigger headaches in some people, for most of us it is an effective headache therapy. It is bundled into a number of prescription migraine medications, and is a key ingredient in over-the-counter analgesics like Excedrin and Anacin. That’s not too surprising. What is surprising that it is now being marketed specifically to treat a dreaded malady — the hangover headache. For younger hangover sufferers, there are energy drinks like Monster Rehab and Rockstar Recovery, delivering a bit of morning-after caffeine. And Hangover Joe’s takes the basic energy shot formula and packages it for the over-served. Anacin is capitalizing on this with its trademarked slogan: “Great night. Rough morning. Better day.” A century ago, Coca-Cola’s ads read “Tired? Coca-Cola relieves fatigue.” The newer pitches for hangover remedies, like Anacin’s “Got Sharpied?” campaign, suggest caffeine is once again being viewed as a useful tonic. However it is marketed, we, the coffee-chugging, soda-swilling, caffeine-addicted American public, are delighted to buy all of it, to feed our habit and treat our ills. Murray Carpenter is the author of Caffeinated, How Our Daily Habit Helps, Hurts and Hooks Us, recently published by Hudson Street Press.

As we should all know, Red Bull is no stranger to extreme motorsport, it came as no surprise to see them place eight Pro 4 racing trucks on a specially-designed race course on the hills of Maine’s Sunday River Resort to see who is the fastest on ice. 10,000 spectators braved single-digit temperature to witness motorsport getting an edge on Mother Nature and they were not disappointed with the fierce battles between eight of the country's best professional off-road truck drivers. The racing proved to be intense from start to finish, with the final race pitting long-standing rivals Ricky Johnson against Johnny Greaves. With an extended four-lap final (all other rounds were two laps), Greaves lost to Johnson as he was penalised 5 seconds for gracing a race gate. Watch the clip below to see the 900hp trucks, with specially studded Mud-Terrain BFGoodrich tires, go through the course (complete with jumps, slaloms and more), sideways mostly. http://dai.ly/x1a1m5a Red Bull Frozen Rush Results 1st place - Ricky Johnson 2nd place - Johnny Greaves 3rd place - Bryce Menzies 4th place - Rob MacCachren 5th place - Todd LeDuc 6th place - Scott Douglas 7th place - Greg Adler 8th place - Carl Renezeder

The inaugural Korean Formula 1 Grand Prix saw Sebastian Vettel win again and has also given his team, Red Bull Renault its second Constructors' Championship title. Two titles in a row for both Vettel and Red Bull. I suppose it must be a record in someways. It is also his 10th race win for the 2011 season and his 20th win overall. And win after win keeps on happening. But what of the race itself? Well, the 2011 Korean Formula 1 Grand Prix was pretty interesting. From a point of view that is. Ferrari and McLaren seem to be doing pretty well. Lewis Hamiton, who started on pole position, in the McLaren came in second after Vettel and team mate Jenson Button came fourth after third placed Mark Webber of Red Bull (a good drive from Webber as he always kept Hamilton in sight throughout the race). Ferrari's Fernando Alonso rounded up the top five with a storming drive. He drove a fantastic race and was constantly hounding Jenson Button till the very end, when his tyres basically surrendered and he nearly hit a wall during the penultimate lap or so. There was a racing incident that resulted in the safety car coming out. I seem to enjoy this safety car incidents as I get to watch the Mercedes Benz AMG SLS Safety Car in action. This happened on lap 17 of the race where Viataly Petrov collided into Michael Schumacher's Mercedes the amazing thing is that Vettel, and that Red Bull F1 car he was driving must have been really hooked up pretty well. One would note that when a safety car comes out, the race pack gets bunched up. This would enable all the cars to be close together and when the safety car peels into the pitlane, racing re-starts. You can tell that Vettel is one of those drivers who, with a fantastic car underneath of him can actually pull away from the other competitors and finish the race 12 seconds or so ahead of second place Hamilton. That combination of Vettel and the Red Bull Renault car must be on another place. I supppose it could be said that with three or so races to go, Red Bull has shown us that they hold the key to being fast this year. McLaren seems to be second and Ferrari third throughout the season. Things did get better mid-season as it seemed Red Bull were untouchable prior to this. There is one more interesting thing about the Korean Grand Prix worth mentioning. It cost the Korean GP organisers

Anyone tried this??? its at One Fullerton... looks fun... with many chio bus but rather not put their pics here... MCF many perverts

...and will do so in a street legal Porsche 911 GT3 sponsored by Stuttgart Auto

http://rally.racing-live.com/wrc/en/headli...215125801.shtml igner to contest P-WRC in a Mitsubishi Red Bull driver aiming to secure the title 15/12/06 12:58 Zoom A move from Skoda to Mitsubishi in 2007 The Red Bull Rally Team and his partners announced today that Andreas Aigner will continue in the World Rally Championship in 2007. He will compete in all P-WRC rallies and other selected WRC events. In the production class, Andreas is offered the chance to assert himself against established drivers. Plenty of test, setup and training sessions will be part of the Red Bull Junior's further development. Andreas Aigner also has the opportunity to get to know a couple of new stages. This constitutes another important step in his further development within the sport. Andreas was able to prove his talent in this year's World Rally Championship, the highlight being a sixth place overall in Germany. Now he targets another, very bold goal, winning the P-WRC title, a very hard-to-get, but always underrated merit. Many prominent names have tried and had to learn the hard way before being successful. Andreas Aigner has a clear conception: