Coffee Lover
Cycling and coffee has a unique relationship. You’d be hard-pressed not to find an espresso machine on a Tour de France team bus and the “café stop” is a quintessential part of road cycling culture.
As a cyclist, I also love my coffee. On Saturday mornings, 20 of us file into Mercado San Augustín, a quaint outdoor café in Tucson, AZ, after completing The Shootout. One of the most notorious group rides in the US, The Shootout is a brutally-fast, 70 mile ripper through the Sonoran Desert. If you can’t hold the pace, you get dropped – left behind.
Inside the Mercado is Presta Coffee Roasters, a loosely bike-themed coffee shop. Coffee gives us a chance to socialize when we’re not riding flat-out. We don’t have to shout over the sound of the wind or speak between labored breaths. We can sip on a coffee and snack on a hard-earned pastry while chatting about upcoming races, work, or just whatever comes to mind.
Coffee is also popular with endurance athletes because it’s good for helping tired muscles recover. Coffee contains antioxidants which helps reduce inflammation and the caffeine in your cup increases the production of glycogen, your body’s main fuel source. We arrive to the café exhausted and leave, still tired, but with a renewed energy.