So how bad is alcohol?

boggybrn

I'm trying to get in a good block of base training at the moment. This is going well so far but there is some way to go...

My daughter is now rowing at a fairly serious level and her coach seems to basically ban alcohol pretty much all the time. This sounds a bit grim to me, particularly in the run up to Christmas!

I'l generally have a can of beer or a couple of glasses of wine each evening. Is this likely to impact on the quality or effectiveness of base training?

okgo

It probably isn't ideal.

But I did a 70 mile ride at over 19mph average with a base training group having drunk a cocktail of horrid stuff, 8 cans of beer plus a load of desrt wine, some gin, some tequila some thai shite. And a macdonalds on the way home.

The first few miles were grim, but you soon get through it.

Richj

My daughter is now rowing at a fairly serious level and her coach seems to basically ban alcohol pretty much all the time. This sounds a bit grim to me, particularly in the run up to Christmas!

I rowed seriously in my early 20's, as a crew (4 of us) we didn't drink for 8 months while training for Henley. I'd always trained hard since my early teenage years and since my late teens had drunk pretty hard too. Not drinking made a massive difference for me (as a previous heavy drinker) in terms of building up consistency in training, the early mornings where more manageable and I rarely missed a training session. One thing I noticed once I was drinking alcohol again was a heavy night out (a bottle of wine for me) it would take several days to recover from a training point of view, my heart rate would be elevated and weight training harder.

These days I take a more balanced approach and have just cut down my alcohol intake and I don't drink the night before heavy training sessions.

If you can happily cut out drinking then it'll help from my experience.

shockedsoshocked

Highly calorific, dehydrating, potentially muscle catobolism, disturbs your sleep patterns. It's not great stuff!

boggybrn

I too rowed in my early 20's although it seemed serious at the time - given the amount of drinking it can't have been that serious. I remember that feeling of morning outings after a night out - as soon as we started to work hard I felt drunk again...

It sounds like just being sensible on Friday & Saturday evenings will be enough for now. I find the club run challenging enough with a clear head.

boggybrn

ShockedSoShocked wrote:

Highly calorific, dehydrating, potentially muscle catobolism, disturbs your sleep patterns. It's not great stuff!

This is more worrying...

I have noticed that after a long training session I can often smell ammonia. From a bit of Googling I understand that this is a by product of muscle being used as fuel. This sounds like muscle catabolism. Maybe I should try a week or two with no alcohol to see if there is any difference.

jgsi

Thats the difference between sport training on a serious level (eg having a coach on your case) and one's attempts at becoming fitter and no one to get on your case.
Good coaches will proscribe alcohol as well as faddy diets.

Alex_Simmons/RST

As an aside, studies of athletes that consume some alcohol vs those that did not demonstrated a far higher injury rate (such that it interfered with training and/or competition) amongst those that consumed alcohol. The differences varied quite a bit by sport. For cycling the injury rate for those that drank alcohol was about double that of those that did not.

SteveR_100Milers

Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:

As an aside, studies of athletes that consume some alcohol vs those that did not demonstrated a far higher injury rate (such that it interfered with training and/or competition) amongst those that consumed alcohol. The differences varied quite a bit by sport. For cycling the injury rate for those that drank alcohol was about double that of those that did not.

Were the injuries sustained because they were intoxicated, or when they were sober?!

Personally, much as I like alcohol it's pretty clear to my body that they don't mix. I cannot push hard in an intense track session f I have drunk anything more than a can of guinness the night before, and as for time trialing, it's like being a pilot, I need 72 hours free of any booze otherwise my internal organs start to ache, and my legs squeal much sooner.

mamba80

half a bottle of wine a night? at least 35 units a week. (assuming a 175ml glass) recommending max for male is 24 units,
If you train then why not make the most of you efforts and cut out drinking on 3 nights per week and never b4 a decent ride.
if you find you cant or dont want to cut back then you are becoming an alcoholic.

Herbsman

Alcohol does all sorts of bad stuff to your body. The effects of it lead to reduced training adaptation and increased recovery time. If you're serious about training then why jeopardize it? By drinking regularly and/or to excess you're putting a significant portion of your training effort to waste.

jgsi

OP is probably doing a Father Jack right now in protest as his ratings slump as this thread progresses.
Give him a break.... on the road to alcoholism...?!? bit harsh even for a forum.

boggybrn

Interesting comments so far...

I hadn't really thought before that a drink or two may be decreasing the effectiveness of training. From the comments on here it has to be worth cutting it out for a while, if just to see what the difference is in terms of recovery and response to training.

Here's to a (relatively) sober Christmas. Well maybe just the one day of excess!

nhoj

There's a big difference between "a drink or two" and half a bottle of wine a night. Personally, I keep drinking until New Year, then give it up (until the first weekend in January).

Tom Dean

Herbsman wrote:

Alcohol does all sorts of bad stuff to your body. The effects of it lead to reduced training adaptation and increased recovery time. If you're serious about training then why jeopardize it? By drinking regularly and/or to excess you're putting a significant portion of your training effort to waste.

Can you provide some evidence to back this up please?

It seems obvious that excess alcohol consumption would make training more difficult but I have never heard this claim before.

Alex_Simmons/RST

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15730339
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19079280

Tom Dean

Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15730339
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19079280

Interesting stuff (not that I understand it...)

Is it possible to quantify the effect as per the OP question?

Alex_Simmons/RST

Tom Dean wrote:

Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15730339
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19079280

Interesting stuff (not that I understand it...)

Is it possible to quantify the effect as per the OP question?

Individual responses will always vary, and since one can't apply a control to oneself, then no.

slunker

Nobody giving the positives for alcohol???

1. Makes women look better than they really are (and vice versa)
2. Gives you much more confidence (albiet in a artificial way)
3. It tastes great (Guinness)
4. Makes you crap jokes sound better
5. Allows some people to relax
6. Makes you go faster than you really are ( amount of pints x actual avg speed = new p!ssed avg speed)

Herbsman

Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:

Tom Dean wrote:

Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15730339
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19079280

Interesting stuff (not that I understand it...)

Is it possible to quantify the effect as per the OP question?

Individual responses will always vary, and since one can't apply a control to oneself, then no.

I was trying to say that (How would you make a placebo half-bottle of wine?), but when I pressed submit my post got deleted! I know a few people who used to race the morning after a night of boozing, and didn't do too badly. Must be that alcohol contains more energy than carbohydrate.

pauldavid

I like riding my bike, enjoy a little training on the turbo and a drop of Cider.

Not wanting to completely give up drinking does not make me a potential alcoholic.

However, those who don't drink atall as it affects how your body reacts to training in my experience are both boring tw @ ts and generally no faster than me.

So there

Lookyhere

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/157163.php

Anger! is it nr drinking time for you ?

Alex_Simmons/RST

Herbsman wrote:

Must be that alcohol contains more energy than carbohydrate.

Alcohol (at 7 calories per gram) is more energy dense than carbs (4 cal/g). Fat is 9 cal/g.
But it's worse because alcohol cannot be metabolised directly by the muscles, unlike carbs and fats (well glycogen and free fatty acids).

Herbsman

Wasn't being serious Alex!

Thick Tester

It's not bad stuff, had 8 pints the night before our club RR and stil finished in the bunch. The only time i give it up is a couple of weeks before a 12 hour..

Tom Dean

Thick Tester wrote:

It's not bad stuff, had 8 pints the night before our club RR and stil finished in the bunch. The only time i give it up is a couple of weeks before a 12 hour..

This is the kind of encouragement I am looking for! Especially with xmas coming up.

mclarent

This is not the first alcohol related post I've seen on here. On thing they seem to have in common is the need to justify current lifestyle choices. I usually find if I need to justify a behaviour to myself, I should probably be looking at changing the behaviour.

Tom Dean

mclarent wrote:

This is not the first alcohol related post I've seen on here. On thing they seem to have in common is the need to justify current lifestyle choices. I usually find if I need to justify a behaviour to myself, I should probably be looking at changing the behaviour.

Sometimes our lifestyle choices conflict with each other e.g. drinking alcohol and training optimally. It's not about justification, it's about finding a balance, which is what the OP was asking about.

ps my last post was meant to be a joke (sort of)

mclarent

Fair point, though my response was much more general than the specific details of the OP.

To be more specific then: "a couple of glasses of wine a night", lets assume that's 5 out of 7 nights and no "oh just one more, it's the weekend" style activity, glass of wine is 2 units, 4 units a night, 20 units a week - recommended for men is no more than 21 units.

So no, that's at best at the outer limits of healthy alcohol consumption and almost certainly not conducive to good training (base or otherwise).

boggybrn

Well I've started the experiment... no alcohol since last Friday.

So far I haven't missed it, but have yet to notice any difference during or after training. I was still properly tired after the weekend (2 hours Friday, 1.5 hours Saturday & 3.5 hours Sunday). After a day off yesterday's steady turbo session was fine.

I guess that it is somewhat early days yet. I have a fairly heavy (for me) load planned for this week, then an easier time next week. I'm looking forwards to a good bottle of wine with Christmas lunch - followed by the traditional afternoon nap! The ride on Boxing Day could be challenging...

Tom Dean

mclarent wrote:

Fair point, though my response was much more general than the specific details of the OP.

If people try to justify their behaviour it may be because they are told 'alcohol intake is detrimental to training' (which I think most can readily accept) but not how detrimental it is. What are you supposed to do with this information, assuming you already moderate your intake in daily life?

mclarent wrote:

To be more specific then: "a couple of glasses of wine a night", lets assume that's 5 out of 7 nights and no "oh just one more, it's the weekend" style activity, glass of wine is 2 units, 4 units a night, 20 units a week - recommended for men is no more than 21 units.

So no, that's at best at the outer limits of healthy alcohol consumption and almost certainly not conducive to good training (base or otherwise).

This assumes that 20 units is less healthy than 0 units which in general health terms may not be the case. Some health benefits of moderate alcohol consumption are mentioned in the first link Alex posted.