Every Monday morning whiling I catch up the bus to take the first class, I can see a lot of runners running with their pedometers passing me. And at that moment, I can feel a deep guilty about the last-night beer in my stomach. As a runner like those people, I feel like drinking this hobbit decreased good thing running bring to my body. As runners, we have enough daily excise, and it is so good for our health. But some of us still drink, even drink a lot during the weekend. So, is there any influence will drinking and bring to runners? How bad they are to our daily excise?
The most noticeable influence drinking can bring to runners is not as complicated as the people thought, but can be described by just one word: fat. Lots of runners use running as a perfect way to keep body’s shape and lose weight, but a pint of beer can ruin your last days 3 miles running. Although beers do not contain the real fat, it has bulk, which can effectively stretches people’s stomach lining. So that people who drink beers usually are easier to have bigger appetites. Except that, beer contains sugar. Proved by one research from years ago, a pint of beer contains nearly 400 calories, so if we count in this way, three pints is about 1200 calories. But a man in a sedentary job needs only 2500 calories to keep life going per day. It’s almost a half of that number! After seeing that, it is not difficult to explain why some runners still have beer belly. Under this paragraph is a list of calories for beers, maybe it can work for runners to decide how much beers they want to drink for the next time.
• 12 oz. of beer (~150 calories)
• 4 oz. of wine (~100 calories)
• 1.25 oz. of liquor (~100 calories)
Besides the annoying fat that drinking would bring to runners, here’s another effect from beer drinking- the mineral depleting. As is known to all, our body’s inside balance is achieved due to different minerals co-operation. But for alcohol- as a diuretic, it would cause the urinary excretion of calcium and magnesium. How important calcium to our body is obviously, it is an essential material for runners bone health. As to magnesium, magnesium is an important co-factor for a few of enzymes involved in transferring phosphate groups to produce ATP (energy). Without ATP in our body, running cannot be achieved.
All of those things, even though they do make sense in pure science field, we cannot say that the truth is exactly act in the same way. In my Communication class, there’s a word named “experimental realism” which said that rules worked in lab maybe not work in the same way as they did in our real world. Like the influence of drinking to runners, as I can see, it depends on personal situation, like different runner’s diet and their running habits. But all in all, if you plan to take a run tomorrow, don’t drink across the line is a wise choice!
Citation:
http://runnersconnect.net/running-nutrition-articles/alcohol-and-endurance-running/
https://www.google.com/search?q=drinking&rls=com.microsoft:en-US:IE-Address&rlz=1I7DMUS&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=MjlEVNGdGerbsATU_YGwCg&ved=0CAgQ_AUoAQ&biw=1280&bih=907#rls=com.microsoft%3Aen-US%3AIE-Address&tbm=isch&q=drinking%20beer&revid=960743276&imgdii=_
http://www.theguardian.com/notesandqueries/query/0,,-194879,00.html
http://www.aperfectpint.net/What%20is%20Beer%20-%20The%20Basics.pdf<a
After reading your article, I decided to do a little research of my own! I have heard that alcohol effects runners, as well, but I never knew why. Although you wrote a few reasons as to why alcohol is bad for runners, I found more evidence! According to Dena Evans, alcohol makes the body increase in urinary outputs. She states “The consumption of 50 g of alcohol in 250 milliliters (mL) of water (i.e. approximately 4 drinks) causes the elimination of 600 to 1,000 mL (or up to 1 quart) of water over several hours.” As many of us know, losing water before we exercise can cause major challenges! Our muscles tense up. We could collapse. We could have low blood sugar. There are many different things that could happen from just a little bit of alcohol. Check out the article! http://runcoach.com/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=307:will-drinking-alcohol-affect-my-running?&Itemid=444
I agree with the post Even though beer has the same calories as other kind of food as far as consuming thm and burning them off, the effects are totally different.
There is a understimation of the way in which alcohol use, even in small amounts, can nullify the hard work by erasing the effects of workous, reducing endurance and compromising mental game. First, as Richard said, alcohol use cancels out gains from your workouts, another factor to take in consideration is dehydration; alcohol is a toxin that travels trough your bloodstream to every organ and tissue in your body, casing dehydration and slowing your body`s ability to heal itself.
https://www.princeton.edu/uhs/pdfs/NCAA%20Alcohol%20and%20Athletic%20Performance.pdf
My hockey trainer always told us that every night we spend out drinking is an entire week lost of our workouts and progression. I always questioned how true that actually was but seeing in your post that you lose about 3 miles worth of running per every pint of beer you drink definitely complements my trainers warning to us. What I never realized were how many calories you were actually consuming while drinking a pint of beer. An entire half a day’s worth is definitely enough to start adding on the pounds quick. What I decided to look up was whether alcohol calories were the same as food calories as far as consuming them and burning them off go and I found a website that explains why they are in fact the same, yet processed differently, having a different effect of your body.
http://drinks.seriouseats.com/2013/10/cocktail-science-do-alcohol-calories-count-digesting-spirits.html