Far more often than I would have ever thought, I get asked why drinking gets in the way of achieving fitness goals. I also get more pushback from clients on cutting alcohol from their diets than I do regarding anything else. Most people don’t want to give up alcohol -- they would rather sacrifice anything else first.
Oddly enough, these same people will usually give up alcohol as part of a broader diet, like Whole30, and the pounds will come off. They’ll credit the diet but fail to realize that a good amount of that weight loss came just from cutting alcohol.
After explaining this for the millionth time to a new client, who was also a one time colleague of mine back in my lawyer days, I decided to make a list of the reasons why drinking is a bad habit if you’re looking to get in shape. Because if there’s anything people love as much as alcohol, it’s lists.
1. ALCOHOL IS POISON
Your body sees alcohol as poison – or, at least, as a toxic substance that does not belong in it. As a result, your body makes removing that poison the number one priority outside of basic life sustaining processes. Just as alcohol impairs your brain, it also impairs all non-essential functions throughout your body until you expel it.
Drinking is like pulling the handbrake on your metabolism. Your body works on processing out the toxic alcohol as fuel rather than burning existing fat cells or using other pre existing sources of sugar. And for those of you trying to increase muscle mass, protein synthesis takes a backseat, and along with that goes building new muscle.
2. ALCOHOL IS EMPTY CALORIES
This is one most people realize, but it still bears repeating. Just as you wouldn’t think eating Pixy Stix is good for losing weight, neither is alcohol. Depending on what you’re drinking, you could take in an entire day’s worth of calories in just a few drinks. To make matters worse, these aren’t calories that include beneficial macronutrients for muscle synthesis, or cell regeneration, for example. They’re straight up empty calories.
3. ALCOHOL INHIBITS GOOD DECISION MAKING
For some, making a bad decision when drunk that might mean waking up next to the wrong person, or making a fool out of yourself at the Christmas party. For someone on a diet, however, it could mean late night pizza or eating a bag of chips.
Now some claim the body desperately wants greasy food when we drink and/or are hungover, while others think it’s a question of lacking inhibitions. I won’t register an opinion other than to say either way the result is the same: you will eat worse when drunk than you would sober.
4. ALCOHOL RUINS THE NEXT DAY
As a trainer, I constantly get clients who come in and have a “slightly off day” and aren’t sure why. Once we talk about it, it usually comes out that the night before, they had a drink or two more than usual. Overwhelming evidence has come out about how important rest and recovery are to our performance. What you eat and drink absolutely affects your workouts -- it’s just a question of how much.
For some, a night of drinking means skipping the gym altogether, running late to work, and taking a cab when they’d usually walk. Others will make it to the gym and still manage to get a workout in but I defy anyone to tell me that they would not have been able to push harder, ran faster, or lifted a little more if they hadn’t been drinking the night before.
TAKE AWAY
Everything in life is about making choices and analyzing costs versus benefits. If drinking is more important to you than losing weight, that’s your decision -- just appreciate what it is costing you.