Nights Out and Calories

dpr73

I am trying to find a balance with my social life and my body building efforts (as I tend to avoid social situations when I can't track, which I know is not the right thing to do). I think it is important for me to go out with friends when the opportunity presents itself as I am 23 years old and these opportunities will only reduce over time. However, I am curious how you all approach nights out with lifting and counting. Obviously, when I say night out, I mean "drinking." Do you guys allot calories for these drinks? How many calories and how much alcohol is safe to drink when I go out? Any other adjustments I should be wary of?

stwida

Everything you consume 'counts'. It depends on what your intentions are for that day. Are you allowing yourself to treat the drinks as 'cheat consumption' and go over your calorie goal for the day, or are you trying to include the drinks in your daily calorie goal?

All beverages will differ depending on types of liquids used... Vodka tonic is essentially just vodka. Vodka cranberry is now adding cranberry juice. You get the idea. I'd recommend keeping drinks simple, and avoiding anything with fruit juice as a base (high sugar, and usually a bunch of garbage if they don;t use real fruit juice and opt for processed garbage).

Also, if you want to get really picky, alcohol supposedly has the added negative effect of slowing your metabolism. I've seen that in enough places on the internet to believe it to be true, but I don't have a source to cite, so take that as you will.

If you're truly dedicated to tracking your progress, my advice would be to look up the 'nutrition' facts for a few drinks you enjoy. Only order those drinks when you're out. I try to stick to simple [liquor + tonic], maybe with a lemon in it to give it some zing/flavor. I don't mind gin, but whatever you choose... be smart about it, if that's what you want to do.

dpr73

cnewsom1237 wrote: »

Everything you consume 'counts'. It depends on what your intentions are for that day. Are you allowing yourself to treat the drinks as 'cheat consumption' and go over your calorie goal for the day, or are you trying to include the drinks in your daily calorie goal?

All beverages will differ depending on types of liquids used... Vodka tonic is essentially just vodka. Vodka cranberry is now adding cranberry juice. You get the idea. I'd recommend keeping drinks simple, and avoiding anything with fruit juice as a base (high sugar, and usually a bunch of garbage if they don;t use real fruit juice and opt for processed garbage).

Also, if you want to get really picky, alcohol supposedly has the added negative effect of slowing your metabolism. I've seen that in enough places on the internet to believe it to be true, but I don't have a source to cite, so take that as you will.

If you're truly dedicated to tracking your progress, my advice would be to look up the 'nutrition' facts for a few drinks you enjoy. Only order those drinks when you're out. I try to stick to simple [liquor + tonic], maybe with a lemon in it to give it some zing/flavor. I don't mind gin, but whatever you choose... be smart about it, if that's what you want to do.

Well given that things "count," is there ever an appropriate time to do a "cheat consumption today?" It would seem like we should always be making them fit for the overall day, anything else would cause weight gain. Right?

Also, generally, I would just like to make them fit in my day. So I am guessing like 600 calories is sufficient for just drinks?

stwida

It completely depends on your goals and what you want.
Personally, I've found that when it comes to 'cheat meals', it's easier to consider your weekly goal rather than your daily goal. Crunch the numbers and find out how much over your daily goal your 'cheat meal' is going to put you. Divide that overage amount by the number of days left in the week, and reduce your caloric intake for the rest of those days by that amount. That way, by the time your week is over, you'll still net out to whatever your weekly goal was, assuming you've been sticking to it and have the willpower to decrease calories even further than usual in the days to come.

The 'end of your week' doesn't have to be hardcoded to a single day, like Sunday, for example. You could just as easily take the amount of calories you're going to be over your goal for the day, divide by 7, and commit to being that many calories under your typical goal for the next week from that day itself.

Fitness and calorie counting is all net/net. If you're 1,000 over today, you will never get back to where you were prior to being 1,000 over until you accumulate 1,000 under worth of calories.

Any time can be an appropriate time, if you plan for it to be.

dpr73

cnewsom1237 wrote: »

It completely depends on your goals and what you want.
Personally, I've found that when it comes to 'cheat meals', it's easier to consider your weekly goal rather than your daily goal. Crunch the numbers and find out how much over your daily goal your 'cheat meal' is going to put you. Divide that overage amount by the number of days left in the week, and reduce your caloric intake for the rest of those days by that amount. That way, by the time your week is over, you'll still net out to whatever your weekly goal was, assuming you've been sticking to it and have the willpower to decrease calories even further than usual in the days to come.

The 'end of your week' doesn't have to be hardcoded to a single day, like Sunday, for example. You could just as easily take the amount of calories you're going to be over your goal for the day, divide by 7, and commit to being that many calories under your typical goal for the next week from that day itself.

Fitness and calorie counting is all net/net. If you're 1,000 over today, you will never get back to where you were prior to being 1,000 over until you accumulate 1,000 under worth of calories.

Any time can be an appropriate time, if you plan for it to be.

I agree with this, my only issue is that I tend to lose weight when I try to save calories weekly. For example, I have tried recently to hit 2400-2450 daily calories and then once a week (usually Saturday) having a cheat meal out (burger and fries and maybe one or two beers), where I also save about 1200 calories that day for the big meal as well. However, I steadily have dropped weight and so now have increased to 2550-2600. However, I am unsure if I am doing any of this right at this point. I would love to have a balanced social life and good control over my weight trajectory, but I seem to not have it nailed down yet after over 4 years.

Deviette

It depends on how much drinking and how much dancing you intend on doing.

If you've been drinking less anyway, you'll probably have a lower tolerance to alcohol, so you might find that less is more than satisfying for the requirements.

You can drink low calorie beers, some people like the flavour. If you're looking a spirits however (the naturally much lower calorie beverages) it's normally what you've mixed it with that is more of a factor to calories than the alcohol itself. Go for diet mixers and try an avoid cocktails with fruit juices or grenadine (Mojitos are a good choice though)

Keep away from the junk food that alcohol normally makes us buy, and try and drink plenty of water between the booze. It keeps you hydrated, and less likely to over indulge

Logging wise, the less complicated your drink, the easier it is to log. You can try logging your drinks before you go out if you want, so you know exactly how many you're prepare to have out. You might find that easier to stop yourself from getting carried away.