Booze the night before...

Nick Fitt

Anyone know how much damage drinking the night before does to a training session/race? Is there any science to this - obviously being hammered at 1 a.m. isn't conducive

Gizmo_

Lots of science.

AIUI it's not the alcohol in your system that's the problem, it's the compounds that your body processes alcohol into: when your body needs to increase the flow of oxygen to the muscles, all these compounds are still floating around in the blood and soak up the oxygen.

lc1981

On one episode of the Cycle Show, Kristian House was drinking red wine the night before heading up the Stelvio Pass. He suggested that he often has a glass of red, but I imagine only one!

team47b

Because alcohol is a diuretic, it makes your kidneys produce more urine, drinking too much of it can lead to dehydration, you need to be hydrated when you exercise to maintain the flow of blood through your body, which is essential for circulating oxygen and nutrients to your muscles, so dehydration leads to reduced performance.

Your body won’t be able to clear out the lactic acid you produce when you exercise because your liver will be working harder to get rid of the toxic by-products of alcohol in your system.

Alcohol interferes with the way your body makes energy. When you’re metabolising or breaking down alcohol the liver can’t produce as much glucose, which means you have low levels of blood sugar. Exercise requires high levels of sugar to give you energy. If your liver isn’t producing enough glucose, your performance will be adversely affected. If you force your body to run from your supplies of fat rather than blood sugar, you will be slower and have less energy and won’t be able to exercise as intensely.

Of course I am only telling you this as I am diabetic and also not able to drink so am completely jealous and recommend you get pissed on my behalf - please

graham.

team47b wrote:

Of course I am only telling you this as I am diabetic and also not able to drink so am completely jealous and recommend you get pissed on my behalf - please

Consider it done!

team47b

Oh and it takes about 3 hours for your liver to remove the alcohol in one large glass of wine or strong pint of beer (average) so go to bed at midnight go training at 9am, that's only 3 drinks the night before, I require you to drink more than that - of course

average varies depending on your weight/amount of food/your sex/metabolic rate etc

solosuperia

I used to adhere to a strict routine of no booze the night before a race..........
Cannot remember what triggered it but I had a pint of Guiness the night before a race!

I went like a train.

Anybody want to guess what the new regime became.
Substituted lager for Guiness on the continent, didn't have the same results though!!!!!!

team47b

so guinness is now the cyclists drug of choice

Kieran_Burns

team47b wrote:

so guinness is now the cyclists drug of choice

Iron man?

AchillesLeftKnee

SoloSuperia wrote:

I used to adhere to a strict routine of no booze the night before a race..........
Cannot remember what triggered it but I had a pint of Guiness the night before a race!

I went like a train.

Anybody want to guess what the new regime became.
Substituted lager for Guiness on the continent, didn't have the same results though!!!!!!

Guiness makes me fart like the hammers of hell the day after, so it may be that you were jet propelled that day.

Nick Fitt

I've just started to up my riding to start racing again next year and at 46, I can tell you that any more than 1 glass of wine the night before training and forget it. At least I now understand some of the science behind it. Off now to find some liver performance enhancing supplements!

Dunno about Guiness, it is supposed to have lots of goodness in it though, ...wives tail?

Sussed out

Nick Fitt wrote:

I've just started to up my riding to start racing again next year and at 46, I can tell you that any more than 1 glass of wine the night before training and forget it. At least I now understand some of the science behind it. Off now to find some liver performance enhancing supplements!

Dunno about Guiness, it is supposed to have lots of goodness in it though, ...wives tail?

Your wife has a tail? And she puts it in your Guinness? Weird!

okgo

I've raced on 10 pints the night before, I felt worse for it for the first few miles, but it quickly was fine.

I did a 90 mile training ride the other week after drinking a totally stupid amount, I felt rough at first, but again was fine after about 20 miles (till it rained!).

As a general rule I don't drink the night before races, but it isn't going to make too much difference if you have a pint or two/glass of wine or two. Suppose it depends on more than that, but a 2/3/4 type race is generally not that taxing if you are not in every attack so you can easily recover in the bunch.

Ands

I did a hangover ride in the Peak District a couple of weeks ago after a big night out. Felt terrible at first and initial climbs were slow and painful. I managed to completely forget about my hangover until I stopped at cafe after ~50km and realised what a monster headache I had - getting back on the bike was hard. However, after the cafe stop I felt really strong and set PBs on all 3 remaining climbs of the day. There must be some science in there somewhere .

Herbsman

Have you tried searching medline? http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/

Try search phrases like 'alcohol athletic performance' or 'alcohol inhibit adaptation endurance training'

Nick Fitt

hm, it used to be a point of honour amongst my mates and myself to be the last out of the bar the night before a race or etape, training ride or whatever, age wearies us though. Great info Team47b, just what I was hoping to learn, thanks