5 Ways Alcohol Ruins Your Muscle Building Efforts and Makes You Fat

There is an instant way in which you can deduce if someone is serious about their muscle building efforts. That way is how they handle their alcohol and if they drink it at all. Endless studies have shown that alcohol consumption will greatly hinder muscle building. Drinking alcohol in large quantities and building muscle is never a good combination. And when you go out with your friends at night, hitting the clubs, know that they aren’t doing you any favors when they tell you to ‘just have a couple of drinks, it’s no big deal’. In this article we present you five ways in which alcohol consumption will never allow you to build a substantial amount of muscle:

1. It hinders protein synthesis and reduces the release of growth hormone

Studies have shown that drinking alcohol hinders protein synthesis in your muscles which in turn reduces the total amount of lean muscle. Protein synthesis happens when the body supplies the muscle tissue with enough protein for it to grow. Another essential factor to building muscle that alcohol consumption hinders is the release of growth hormone. The exact same compound you might have heard bodybuilders inject so they can get huge. Abusing alcohol can lead to a reduction in GH production by startling 70 percent. That’s why you shouldn’t complain why you aren’t getting bigger when you are binge drinking all the time.

2. It slows down recovery time

The more efficiently you can recover from your workouts, the more muscle gains you will experience. Even though you think you might get away with popping pills to speed up the recovery process, none of it will matter of you keep drinking alcohol, since your muscles will not be able to recover properly. When you train, your muscle fibers experience micro-damage and considering the fact that alcohol hinders protein synthesis, the muscles won’t recover on time.

3. Metabolism which burns fat is also hindered, which leads to gaining weight

When alcohol is ingested, the body burns it for energy by prioritizing calories from it and putting the calories from carbs and fat behind. So, if losing weight is one of your primary goals you should eliminate it altogether. Alcohol is also known to have the so-called ‘empty calories’, which is a fancy word for calories that don’t have any nutritional value. These calories have a value of 7 calories in one gram. For example, something as small as a 30 ml drink will provide you with around a 100 useless calories.

4. It speeds up dehydration and prevents the muscle from accumulating water

It’s been well known for a long time that muscles cells holding water have the ideal environment for muscle growth. Alcohol takes this water out of the water cells and hinders muscle growth. It also hinders the accumulation of vital nutrients that are required for proper contraction and relaxation of the muscle fibers.

5. It significantly reduces testosterone levels

Alcohol is most notorious for both decreasing testosterone levels and increasing the levels of the estrogen hormone which is most prevalent in women. When you are most intoxicated, around 30% of the body’s testosterone levels plummet. Simply said, the more alcohol you have in you, the more decreased testosterone levels become.