I can see the naming meeting now. 'MORE WORDS. MORE TWITCHY LINES. MORE ACTION, DAMN YOUR EYES.'

It seems that the energy shot market is booming.  Something that was fairly unknown in this country just a few months ago has blossomed into something you see in cardboard display boxes in dodgy newsagents nationwide.  Naturally, this is music to my ears, and when my flatmate found the latest in an established brand producing an energy shot he brought one home for me to shove down me and process for Science.

You can tell that this comes from an established brand simply by looking at the label design.  Namely, it doesn’t look like it contains excess coolant from a Chinese sprocket factory – some actual effort and money has gone into its design.  The name, however, is nothing less than hilarious.  I get that they wanted to put across that drinking it would result in waking up, but seriously – ‘Alert Plus’?  They might as well have called it ‘Rocket Nitro Supermax 5000′.

There’s 120mg of caffeine in this (equivalent to two large cups of coffee), and as such it’s slightly bigger than your usual energy shot, so it’s harder to just pour down your throat bypassing your tongue.  This would be a very bad thing if it tasted horrendous – and, of course, it does.  Seriously, I do not get why no effort has gone into making these things not taste like you’re gulping down homebrewed teabag wine mixed with methylated spirit.  But as Chopper says, “harden the fuck up, Dave”.

Does it work?  Yes, it does, very well – but with caveats.  About half an hour after drinking it, I was hit by a massive (but brief) bout of nausea.  I put this down to this having more caffeine than a usual shot, and as such a higher chance of irritating my stomach.  In any case, it didn’t last very long, and then we were away.

Stimulation-wise, it does what it says on the tin – and quite well.  A medium to rough come-up, with a plateau higher than normal (which is to be expected – as I’ve said, more caffeine than other shots).  I was very slightly twitchy at the plateau, but otherwise just pleasantly energetic.  I didn’t notice the comedown at all (or it’s lasting a lot longer than expected) which was another pleasant discovery.

So, yeah.  This is my new favourite – it tastes slightly better than the Quick Energy Shot, lasts longer and is smoother.  The nausea was a little odd, and when I have another one in the future I’ll update this post as to whether it was a one-off.