There was a study on caffeine and pain killers I read a while back. In some cases the caffeine worked better than the pain killers. In most cases the caffeine helped the pain killers work better.
Nice link. When I had a protruding disc at L5/S1, norco 10's helped get through the day, but having caffeine (more of the pre workout as opposed to coffee) helped me continue to workout through the pain. I eventually had surgery (ADR, NOT fusion) and being in somewhat decent shape helped me to recover a lot faster than my peers.
(post is archived)