How To Drink Alcohol While Building Muscle and Losing Fat

You probably already know drinking more than 1-2 drinks of alcohol (in any form) per day is NOT good for you. Here’s why:

• Body treats it like estrogen, which is your enemy
• Slows fat loss.
• Full of empty calories.
• Affects quality of sleep.
• Dehydrates you (main cause of hangovers)
• Real bad for your liver.

My professional advice: Don’t drink at all if you want to make maximum muscle gains and lose as much fat as possible.

But let’s face it. This is the real world, and you probably like to drink as much as the next guy (the younger you are the more you probably like to drink). So here’s some tips to keep your muscle building and fat loss on progress when you choose to “indulge”:

Drink Plenty of Water

A lot of the bad stuff that comes from drinking can be curbed with water consumption. Alcohol dehydrates you, so drink lots of water before, during (if possible) and definitely before going to bed. Alcohol also helps your body eliminate the massive amount of toxins you just doused it with in the form of alcohol.

Avoid Sugary mixers

Stay away from sugary mixers in your hard alcohol. Eating sugar while drinking alcohol is about the worse thing you can do for fat gain.

No carbs

If you’re consuming alcohol don’t eat carbs before, during or after. In a nutshell: The carbs get turned to fat much easier because your body is trying to process the alcohol. Also, Protein will stay with you longer so you won’t eat as much… and the higher thermic rate makes it less likely to promote fat gain.

Stick to the 1-2 drinks a day during weekdays

There’s already enough evidence to suggest that 1-3 drinks a day is good for you. If you enjoy drinking a beer or two a day or glasses of wine or whatever, don’t worry about it. Try not to binge EVERY night. If you’re going to binge…

Drink hard only a couple days a week.

Like Friday and Saturday, or something like that. Here’s what to do: Don’t eat much during the day if you’re going to party it up that night. Then make sure you get some good protein into your system to help coat your stomach. Also, some foods high in fiber like beans is also good. It will stay with you and help you feel fuller, maybe absorb some toxins–definitely help flush them out the next day when you “eliminate”.

Exercise 2-3 hours before you party

Because your muscles get depleted of glycogen after you workout… doing this might make it easier for your body to turn even more of the empty calories you ingest later on that night into muscle, instead of fat.

Don’t pig out after getting drunk

Most people drink till they’re really drunk, then get hungry and decide to eat a bunch of crap food. This is NOT going to help. Follow the protein tip above, and drink more water to help you feel full.

Play beer pong or other games

You might actually burn 20-30 calories in a “Vigorous” game of beer pong. You’ll probably drink more though as a result. My advice: Drink less to make your aim better — so you drink less during the game (because you’re winning) which overall leads to less drinking! Play “strip” versions of these games for even more fun.

If you just want to get drunk, be efficient

It’s NOT healthy (emotionally, mentally OR physically) to drink to “get drunk” but I realize this is why most people do it. They drink because they think it makes them more confident, more brave, or more well liked. That’s all bullsh*t, you really need to get your confidence issues handled, but I realize most people still do it.

So if you’re drinking for “effect” then remember: be efficient. Get a high alcohol spirit like Everclear or 151, cut it with ice and water, or do a couple shots, you’ll get drunk faster. And you won’t have to drink as much. (at least it’s better than drinking 36 beers right?)

I can’t believe I’m giving this advice, but I know people will still do it, so just be “efficient” about it and maybe it’ll help you not to go overboard next time.

Choose low calorie beers and wines

Light beers are lowest. Dark stouts (like Guiness!) are next. Followed by the rest. Red wines are lower in calories (and contain more resveratrol), followed by the rest.

Hangover help:

In the morning, you might be hungover here’s some tips:

• Avoid NSAID’s like aspirin, ibprofen, etc because combined with the alcohol it is super bad for your liver and stomach, etc…
• Drink water and gatorade to replenish electrolytes, etc…
• Take a multivatmin/mulit-mineral to further replenish…
• Get some protein in you, eggs, bacon, etc are good…
• Exercise moderately to sweat some toxins out (make sure you keep drinking water)…
• Take a nap…

You know you shouldn’t… but if you do…

Decide to “over indulge” you should at least follow the guidelines I’ve set out here. The real issue you should address is:

“why do I feel the need to drink so much?”

You’ll probably find out that it’s an issue with your self confidence… not being able to say “no” to your peer group… or trying to “Fit in” or some other such nonsense. Or you don’t like reality and you’re just trying to escape from it by getting trashed. None of these things are healthy and you need to get these issues handled before you do some damage.