What’s up, guys.
Sean Nalewanyj here www.SeanNal.com-www-BodyTransformationTruth.com and I figured for the start of the summer
this was a relevant topic, so I wanted to talk today about bodybuilding and alcohol.
What the actual effects are and some guidelines that you can follow so that you are able to
have a night out drinking with your friends and just enjoy yourself without having to
worry about it negatively impacting your muscle building or you fat burning progress.
Regardless of the fact that you’ll hear a lot of fitness experts out there saying
that alcohol is completely out of the question if you want to get into great shape.
That it will destroy your muscle growth, kill your performance in the gym.
That’s really not the case.
It’s something that I, myself, used to believe but in looking more the actual science of
it and just through personal experience, I discovered that it’s really just not true.
It’s not a question of alcohol itself being either good or bad, and you either can or
can’t drink.
If you’re trying to gain muscle or lose fat it completely depends on how much you’re
drinking, how often you’re doing it and also on how much you allow a night out of
drinking to affect your diet or your training in the overall picture.
So first off, there’s two important points that I want to cover here.
The first is the simple fact that alcohol contains calories.
Okay, that’s about seven calories per gram and if you’re not taking those calories
into account as part of your diet just like you would for any other food or drink then
obviously that going to affect your results in some way.
So alcohol calories do count and the do contribute to your total net energy balance for the day.
And the second important point here is that if you consistently allow your alcohol consumption
to interfere with your training sessions or your regular diet, then again of course that’s
going to have a negative impact.
So, if you go out and drink and you skip a workout as a result or you and your buddies
end up at fat burger at four in the morning for a 1,500 calorie meal then yeah, of course
it’s going to affect you in some way.
So if alcohol is causing behavioral changes in you that throw your program as a whole
off track then there should be no surprise that that’s going to slow down your progress
in some way.
But what happens if you take an otherwise properly structured muscle building and fat
burning plan where you’re staying within your overall calorie targets for the day and
your workout quality and workout consistency isn’t affected.
And then you just simply add some alcohol into the mix and you tracked the calories.
Like I’d mention earlier this isn’t a black and white issue and it does depend largely
on the dosage and the frequency.
And there are going to be individual differences as well depending on genetics and on how different
people handle their alcohol.
So the first situation will just be if you’re a casual, moderate drinkers; so, someone who
like to have maybe a glass of wine in the evening, or go and have a few beers with your
buddies every once in a while.
In situations like that it’s really not something to worry about at all.
It’s not going to slow down your muscle growth or your fat loss.
And studies have actually shown pretty consistently that moderate drinkers, which means no more
that no more than two drinks per day for man and one for a woman, moderate drinkers actually
live longer than non-drinkers and small amounts of alcohol actually protect against a pretty
wide range of diseases.
And I’ll link some research on that in the description box below if you’re interested.
So if you enjoy casual, moderate drinking a glass of wine here, a few beers there, then
assuming that the calories are tracked that’s completely and totally fine and that it’s
probably actually beneficial if anything.
Now what about the effects of the night out of heavy drinking with the purpose of actually
getting drunk?
Again, this is not a black and white issue and I can only give general guidelines because
of that but I would say that as long as you’re doing it in moderation, so let’s say maybe
twice per month as an estimate maybe slightly more or less depending on the person and how
their body processes alcohol and also on how much they’re actually drinking on the night
out, but assuming that you do it relatively infrequently and you go about it properly,
which I’ll give you some guidelines in second here, the yeah, it is possible to go out and
have those nights of heavier drinking without any significant negative effect in terms of
bottom line muscle growth or fat loss.
I’m not saying it’s healthy for you.
Obviously binge drinking it’s not healthy, so that’s something you have to aware of
for yourself and I’m also not saying that it will have zero effect, but the effect from
a pure muscle building or fat burning perspective would probably be pretty minimal if anything,
as long as you’re doing it relatively infrequently.
And you’re just an average gym goer and not some high level athlete trying to squeeze
out every possible inch of progress.
I don’t get this idea that all the in shape body building and fitness YouTubers you watched
or all the trainers at your gym live the squeaky clean lifestyle.
They never drink, they never party.
It’s really not the case.
Myself included.
My life does not revolve around the gym and I do enjoy going out and drinking with friends
just as much as the next guy.
And just because you’re trying to get in shape it doesn’t mean that alcohol is some
evil substance that you have to completely abstain from.
It’s really just about finding the roper balance for yourself and going about it in
an intelligent way, so you don’t fall off track with your program in the bigger picture.
Now, I don’t want to get into big technical discussion about all the research.
I’ll put some links in the description box if that does interest you.
But the main issues that people will usually bring up are that alcohol lowers testosterone
levels and it lowers protein synthesis.
So, on the testosterone issue, there’s mix research here.
Some studies are shown no significant effect even after six to seven drinks.
And even when a really large amount of alcohol is consumed, the effect is only still temporary.
Anywhere from about a fifteen to twenty percent decrease lasting no more than twenty four
hours afterwards.
Now I’ve talked about this before but temporary up and down spikes in testosterone are not
something I’m worry about too much because that’s mostly just about what happens in
the overall picture.
I mean having test levels drop by, say twenty percent, for sixteen hours, two times per
month it’s really not something I would concern myself with.
And even if there was a negative effect from that it probably would be pretty small.
And in my opinion it wouldn’t make sense to sacrifice a part of your life that you
enjoy, just to eke out a few more ounces of muscle growth anyway.
And when it comes to protein synthesis, that’s only been studied in chronic alcoholics and
even then it’s mixed with results on both sides.
So anyone who definitively says that alcohol lowers protein synthesis would be basing it
on rat studies.
And humans and rats do process macro nutrients and toxins differently.
It’s reasonable to assume that there probably some of fact, but again it would probably
only be small and temporary and not be a big issue of concern, again, as long as it’s
only happening infrequently.
Now if you are going to go out drinking there are a few guidelines that I’d recommend
following in order to minimize the negative effect.
So first off, you’re going to want to stick to lower calorie drinks if possible, at least
for the majority of the night.
So dry-wine and spirits are going to be your best bet and then go ahead and mixed them
with low calorie or zero calorie liquids.
Otherwise the total calories on full night out, they’re going to add up pretty quickly.
For example if you’re drinking a bunch of beer or sugary drinks like rum and coke, or
vodka sprite, you’re going to be dumping a lot of extra calories into your diet, which
is definitely could make a difference.
It’s not that you can’t have those higher calories drinks, but just be aware of the
difference.
My drinks of choice are usually just vodka water with lime or rum and coke zero because
they’re clean and easy, and they minimize the amount of total calories that I take in,
without having to think too much about it.
The second guideline is to try to maximize the amount of time between alcohol consumption
and weight training.
So in an ideal world you would avoid training on the same day or on the day after a heavy
night of drinking, because that way your recovery isn’t affected if you train earlier in the
day.
And your performance won’t be affected if you’re training the day after.
But if it’s not possible to do both then at least do to the best you can and space
them out as much as possible.
Number three minimize the amount of fat that you eat on the days where you’re planning
to drink.
This is because acetate, which is the actual toxic component of alcohol, it prevents your
body from burning fat when you consume it.
So the fat that’s in your blood stream, it get stored more easily when you drink,
and so you can minimize that effect by lowering your fat intake down on the days where you’re
drinking.
There’s no set guideline her, but maybe cutting it to around, say half of your normal
fat intake that would probably work well.
The fourth guideline most people would probably don’t need me to tell them this, but just
make sure you drink plenty of water throughout the night if you can as well as the end of
the night before going to bed.
And that’s because alcohol itself is very dehydrating and it will go a long way in minimizing
any potential hangovers the next day and helped you recovered faster if you make sure to stay
properly hydrated.
And the last point, if you’re someone who’s prone to eat heavily after a night of drinking
then make sure to lower your calorie intake earlier on the day so that you can save up
some calories for later on.
Because your judgment and your will power is probably going to be reasonably impaired
by the end of the night, and even if you didn’t saved up any calories, if you’re hungry
at that point you’re probably just going to eat whatever you feel like and not really
care.
So you can medicate that by lowering you calories earlier on in the day.
So bottom line guys, just because you’re trying to build muscle and lose fat it doesn’t
mean that you can’t go out and have fun and drink once in a while if that’s something
that you enjoy doing.
And it is possible to strike a balance between that and your fitness plan.
Again, if alcohol consumption effects your overall [Inaudible] to your program in the
big picture, then that’s something you have to find out for yourself, because everybody’s
different and if that is the case then abstaining completely, or at least having a temporary
period of abstain is probably going to be a smarter option for you.
But assuming that your training and your diet is otherwise unaffected then going out and
drinking on the heavier side once in a while is pretty unlikely to had any real noticeable
effects on your long term results.
Health wise, it’s never going to be ideal but in terms of actual bottom line muscle
growth or fat loss, if you do it properly then you’ll probably going to be fine.
So thanks for watching, guys.
I hope this was helpful for you.
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Thanks for watching, guys.
And I’ll see you in the next video.