Alcohol Doesn't Have to Kill Your Gains

INTRO

Most of my audience is in college. What do college kids do in their free time? They drink. And I'm no different. The problem is finding the balance of having a social life and being able to drink without sabotaging your progress in the gym. The easy solution to that problem would be to stop drinking and only prioritize school/work, training, and recovery without caring about a social life or drinking. That may work for some people, who have that next-level discipline or don’t really care for going out and drinking, but I’m here to appeal to the masses with this article. I think drinking can have a place in your life even when you’re serious about training, as long as you don’t over do it. The purpose of this article is to provide some insight to how much you should be drinking if you do decide to drink, get rid of the negative stigma of drinking, and draw some parallels to the motives behind alcohol consumption and working out. Lastly, I’ll put it into practice and talk about what I actually do when I’m on prep but still want to go out and drink.

THE MOTIVE

Most of us drink just to unwind or socialize with our friends, but the motives behind drinking and exercise have some commonalities.

On one end of the spectrum, people often drink because of feelings of isolation, depression, or anxiety. It can be used to cope with some sort of insecurity. On the other end of the spectrum, people drink because of the social interaction involved. It gives them a chance to loosen up, connect with friends, and even make new ones in a familiar setting. The same can be said about the gym. Some have a deeper reason for working out, such as body image issues or other insecurities. On the other end of the spectrum, people workout because of the intrinsic value they place on seeing progress, both subjective and objective. Another reason would be because they see the gym as a common ground to socialize with others who have similar goals, passions, and interests as them.

I like to come from a perspective of things aren’t necessarily “good” or “bad”, they just are. With that being said, there is a bad stigma placed on alcohol and a good one placed on working out. However, too much of either of these things can both be “bad.” Too much alcohol is obviously bad for your physical health and you’ll neglect your real responsibilities. Too much working out can cause an even worse obsession of body image resulting in eating disorders, and if you spend too much time obsessing over working out you’ll neglect maintaining healthy relationships with family and friends as well as your other responsibilities. I think the best approach would be to not necessarily look at things as good or bad, but to look at how we incorporate them into our lives as good or bad so that we can develop healthy relationships with them. Binge drinking or excessive alcoholism is bad, but a beer at dinner when catching up with friends isn’t bad. Let’s explore this concept in detail.

Alcohol, like most other things, works in a system of diminishing marginal returns, meaning the benefits decrease the more it is used in succession so it’s better off used in moderation. For example, drinking a glass of wine at dinner has certain health benefits because of the antioxidants, but having 6 glasses of wine can cause you to oversleep for work the next day and add a bunch of unnecessary calories. Loyola Marymount University did a study about the biphasic effects of alcohol, summarized in the pictures above. The picture on the left shows the cultural myths of alcohol. Specifically, that more is better in terms of feeling more buzzed. People typically report a level where they’re buzzed and feeling good, but the cultural myth would state that they’d feel even better if they just drank more. The picture on the right shows the reality. There is an optimal range of Blood-Alcohol Content (BAC) for feeling buzzed, and anything more than that, the individual would report negative symptoms.

Going out and drinking with your friends one night might be exactly what you needed to release stress from a long stretch of training and work/school where fatigue has been accumulated over time. Going out four nights in one week however, is detrimental for obvious reasons. The same concept can be applied to exercise. Most powerlifters need about 2 hours per workout to fit all of their necessary exercises with the prescribed volume to progress overtime. This is more than the average person works out, which is about 1 hour per session. 5 hour workouts 6 times a week however, would not be optimal for anyone because they’d be overworked. More of a “good” thing is not always better; it can be good to an extent and there is normally an optimal range or an effective dose that can be applied to that thing. The idea here is to get everyone to stop thinking in such extreme black and white terms, and embrace moderation to live a healthy lifestyle. The key to consuming alcohol without hindering your progress in the gym is to develop a healthy relationship with it.

IMPLEMENTATION AND TIPS

In order to get the most of this information and make it work for you, the following things should be kept in mind:

The necessity to say “NO”: Although we’ve already established that you can consume alcohol in moderation and still make progress in the gym, that doesn’t mean you should jump on every opportunity to do so. To be great at anything, some baseline level of commitment and sacrifice is necessary. If your heaviest squat session of your peaking phase is on a Saturday morning, I wouldn’t recommend going out or drinks the night before if your goal is to have the biggest total you possibly can on the platform.
Eat at maintenance calories: This only applies if you’re cutting without a hard deadline. Eating at maintenance does two things for us. Firstly, if you add in the alcohol, you’re most likely eating the same amount of food you’d be eating anyway on your normal caloric deficit, whereas if you kept your deficit the day you consumed alcohol you’d have to eat much less food that day. This would probably cause you to binge eat and go way over on your calories. Secondly, you’re not necessarily making progress, but you’re not losing any either. Eating at maintenance would allow you to not be in a state of gaining since you’re not in a surplus, but at the same time it wouldn’t throw off your calorie balance enough to where you wouldn’t still lose weight. You just probably wouldn’t lose as much that week. It’s a much safer approach to not sabotage your diet. If you’re cutting with a hard and are approaching that deadline, like for example, 4 weeks out from making weight at a powerlifting meet, then you’re better off not consuming alcohol at all during this point of your training. This would be a mindless waste of calories at this point in time, and would inhibit your recovery since you’re already in a caloric deficit. If you’re in a surplus, I’d just recommend eating the same amount of calories you normally would that day.
Be smart with your drink selection: Not all alcohol is the same. Obviously, personal preference trumps efficiency, but if you want to get the most alcohol that your diet will allow for the least calories, I’d recommend choosing lighter drink options. Light beers have high volume and low calories, which will keep you fuller so you won’t want to drink/eat as much. Straight shots with low/zero calorie mixers or chasers are good options to consider. Keep your drink choices simple. This is where you have to sacrifice a bit if you want to be able to drink a little more.
Hydration: One part of making alcohol fit into your training/nutrition is making sure it fits your calories. The other part is making sure that you’re able to wake up the next day and be productive. To prevent hangovers, I always find it helpful to drink your daily water consumption (if not more) BEFORE you have your first sip of alcohol. For example, I normally drink a gallon of water per day. If I’m drinking that night, I’ll drink an entire gallon of water before I start drinking and even drink a little more before I go to bed. I usually wake up feeling normal as if I hadn’t drank at all, without cotton mouth, and I’m ready to tackle the day.
Calorie Partitioning: This last technique is a little weird and is actually optional, but hear me out. I recommend not eating all of your calories for the day before you start drinking. I recommend saving some calories for two reasons. Firstly, if you eat less during the day, it will probably take less alcohol to get you drunk, which means less calories wasted on alcohol and you’ll be able to eat more anyway. Secondly, saving your calories ensures that you’ll have some left just in case you get hungry after you start drinking. Another tip would be to keep your fats lower that day so you don’t run the risk of going over on your calories that day if you end up drinking more than expected.

HOW TO TRACK ALCOHOL

So at this point, if you’ve taken my advice about making alcohol fitting your calories without turning the whole day into an all-out cheat day, then it’s crucial to know how to actually track alcohol. This is a reminder that even though you’re staying within your calories including the alcohol consumption, alcohol has empty calories and therefore no nutritional value.

The average 12oz light beer has roughly 103 calories

A shot of gin, rum, vodka, rum, or whiskey also has roughly 97 calories.

A mixed drink such as a Pina Colada can have up to 490 calories.

So let’s say you’re cutting with 2000 calories. You decide to eat at maintenance that day because you know you’re going out to the bar with some friends that evening. You decide to eat 1400 of your 2500 total calories that day before you start drinking. You’ve also finished your gallon of water. You want to save money so you decide to pregame before you head out to the bar. You have 3 shots of vodka and chase them with a Sprite Zero. You’re now at 1700 calories on the day. You haven’t drank in 3 weeks because you’ve been on prep and your tolerance is pretty low, so you’re feeling tipsy and ready to head out. You get to the bar and order a Vodka with club soda. You’re now at 1800 calories on the day because club soda doesn’t have any calories. Your buddy buys a round of Bud Light and you follow up with another one 20 minutes later. You’ve had 2 beers and you’re now at 2000 calories on the day. You and your friends leave the bar and are pretty hungry. You stop at a pizza shop and order 2 plain slices that are roughly 250 calories each. You wash that down with a Diet Coke. You are now at 2500 calories. You go home, chugg a bottle of water, and go to bed. You wake up feeling normal and you’re ready to have a productive Saturday. No, your macro balance wasn’t perfect, but you stayed within your calories and optimized the situation. That’s all you can do sometimes. You got to do everything you wanted, but you displayed some self-control. You didn’t black out, and you didn’t scrap the day by eating an entire pizza pie. You realized that the day could be salvaged because of your understanding of the fundamentals of dieting and you have a healthy relationship with alcohol. You went out with your friends, didn’t completely restrict yourself by allowing yourself to drink, didn’t sabotage your diet, and you woke up feeling fine. Mission accomplished.

WHAT I ACTUALLY DO

The way I go about drinking normally depends on whether I’m bulking or cutting, and where I am in my meet prep. For example, if I’m bulking and it’s the offseason, I don’t take much precaution when I’m drinking. On the other extreme, if I’m cutting and I’m 3 weeks out from a meet, I won’t drink at all. I like to limit my drinking to once every two weeks when I’m bulking or in the offseason, but of course there are some stretches where I’ll drink twice in one week and others where I won’t drink for a whole month. When I do drink during these times I’m usually not paying attention to how much I’m drinking. I’m looking to have a good time and I just go based on how I feel. I’m not super strict on calories. When I’m cutting, I really don’t like to drink at all because I know it’s a waste of calories, but in the rare event that I do, I’ll follow the guidelines I mentioned from the previous section. At roughly 4 weeks out, I cut alcohol out completely. I won’t drink for any reason because I need to do everything I can to make sure every session is quality since I’m peaking and dealing with heavier weights. I’ll also be at my lowest caloric intake of the entire prep and be really hungry so again, wasting calories on alcohol wouldn’t be wise. Lastly, the combination of low caloric intake and peaking is going to make it harder for me to recover. Alcohol doesn’t aid with recovery from a nutritional standpoint, and I always go to bed later when I drink. During this month I am prioritizing sleep more than a social life.

I’ll be honest, lately I’ve been drinking a little more than I should. I isolated myself during the last month of my prep for Worlds back in June so that I could focus and minimize variables I know I’d have trouble controlling, so now I’m catching up with people I haven’t seen in a while. I was cutting to make weight back then and now I’m able to attend cookouts and go out to eat more. Since it’s the summer time, more of my friends are free to go out and drink so we take advantage of the opportunity. I like to have fun and although I’m indulging a bit more than usual, I’m not letting it affect my training and other priorities. The only thing really affected is my calorie balance from time to time but I don’t worry about it too much since I’m bulking at 3700 calories. As of now, I’m prepping for Raw Nationals in October at 74kg and I’m expecting some pretty big numbers.

With that being said, would I be able to perform better if I never consumed a drop of alcohol? Maybe. If we are looking to optimize our performance we must control as many variables as we can: great programming, great training, stress-management and mental health, nutrition, and sleep. Would it be optimal for me as a human being? No. I find that I am much happier being able to find a balance in my life with being able to do what I want while being more strict on myself at times when I need to, as opposed to being strict on myself all-year-round. I find that drinking doesn’t really affect me much as long as I maintain a balance; this is what works for ME. I encourage everyone to find what works for them and stick to it, rather than blindly following what someone else does because they have a certain outcome you desire.

Sources

https://academics.lmu.edu/headsup/forstudents/bloodalcoholcontent/

https://www.rethinkingdrinking.niaaa.nih.gov/tools/Calculators/calorie-calculator.aspx

https://rippedbody.com/complete-diet-nutrition-set-up-guide/

https://rippedbody.com/alcohol/