Alcohol and weight gain

OMGSugarOHNOS

while correct in theory---you are wrong in fact. Not all calories support muscle gain and likewise not all calories support fat gain. BUT THEIR ARE THOSE WHO TAKE SIDES!!! So choose wisely

zomg please enlighten us

OMGSugarOHNOS

I just finished a 12 week bulk. Sucessfully gained strength, muscle, fat and fluffiness. One or two nights a week I subsituted my bowl of ice cream out for beer & wine (usually around 500-1000cals)

maybe my next bulk I'll try to do it without the booze and report back. Slight chance....YOLO

Rachelc1992

I gained all my weight through drinking alcohol!! Not in a good way may I add, it's why I'm her trying to shift the fat now! But I was backpacking and it was a bluddy good time, so who cares x

HarolDean

You didn't specify what kind of weight you want to gain (muscle, fat). So yes, alcohol will make you gain weight. If you are talking about muscle though, I don't think alcohol is the weight gainer of choice, simply because it has no nutritional value.

Let's say he wants to gain muscle. Say he's 150 lbs and eats 150g of protein and carbs, and 100g of fat per day. Now he needs another 600 calories for a modest weight increase. Why not take 6 shots of vodka to meet that?

Depends on when you take the 6 shots. If that's your approach then wait at least 2 hours after working out to give your muscles time to rehydrate and recover.

It's definitely not the best approach as it decreases blood flow, reduces testosterone and impairs protein synthesis.

I like to go out and have a good time even though I recognize it's not the best thing for me

fitniss

Alcohol will cause you to gain weight but definitely not muscle. Alcohol eats away at muscle mass.

staceypunk

I don't agree with the "If it fits in your macros" when it comes to alcohol. For me it goes straight to my midsection.

in_the_stars

I don't agree with the "If it fits in your macros" when it comes to alcohol. For me it goes straight to my midsection.

Me too. I lose 5-7 pounds if I don't drink wine for 10 days or so.

kaned_ferret

Alcohol eats away at muscle mass.

Does it have some magic atrophying property that science has overlooked?

Whilst I have lost more from cutting down alcohol, I believe it is simply due the reduction in calories - and whilst I'm enjoying losing and being fitter, I still enjoy my wine - if it means I have to hit the cross trainer to fit it in, so be it.

As a great lady on my friends list says, "Will run for wine". :drinker:

whiteheaddg

Alcohol will cause you to gain weight but definitely not muscle. Alcohol eats away at muscle mass.

Nope!

NRBreit

I'm still waiting for someone to try a bulk where they hit their macros at maintenance calorie level and drink booze for their surplus. Assuming they are training/lifting hard, I'm very curious as to the composition of the weight gain.

KANGOOJUMPS

nah

Amadbro

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11584159

BACKGROUND:
Acute and chronic alcohol intoxication decreases skeletal muscle protein synthesis under in vivo conditions. We investigated whether ethanol (EtOH) and its major metabolites, acetaldehyde and acetate, can directly modulate protein balance under in vitro conditions.

METHODS:
Human myocytes were incubated with different doses of EtOH for varying periods of time (i.e., 4-72 hr). Alternatively, cells were incubated with acetaldehyde, acetate, insulin, insulin-like growth factor-I (IGF-I), or with a combination of EtOH plus insulin or IGF-I. Rates of protein synthesis or degradation were determined by 35S-methionine/cysteine incorporation into or release from cellular protein.

RESULTS:
A significant, 15% to 20%, decrease in basal protein synthesis was observed after 24 hr, but not at earlier time points, in response to 80 mM EtOH. Incubation of myocytes for 72 hr decreased synthesis in cells incubated with EtOH ranging between 60 and 120 mM. The ability of IGF-I or insulin to stimulate protein synthesis was impaired by 30% and 60%, respectively, in cells incubated with 80 mM EtOH for 72 hr. Exposure of cells to 200 microM acetaldehyde or 5 mM Na-acetate also decreased basal protein synthesis. In contrast, neither EtOH, acetaldehyde, nor acetate altered the basal rate of protein degradation. However, EtOH completely impaired the ability of insulin and IGF-I to inhibit proteolysis. Finally, EtOH did not impair IGF-I receptor autophosphorylation, but inhibited the ability of insulin to phosphorylate its own receptor. EtOH also did not alter the number of insulin or IGF-I receptors or the formation of insulin/IGF-I hybrid receptors.

CONCLUSIONS:
We have demonstrated that EtOH can directly inhibit muscle protein synthesis under in vitro conditions. Neither EtOH nor its metabolites altered basal protein degradation, although EtOH did compromise the ability of both insulin and IGF-I to slow proteolysis. This impairment seems to be mediated by different defects in signal transduction.

EtOH (Ethanol) is what caused it..not "dehydration" LOL. You get an A for effort though

Read the study you just posted.

That is do do with the effects on protein synthesisation in vitro. The human body is not in vitro, it is rather in vivo and one should really not attempt to link the two.

Ok read the other 2 I posted which were not conducted in vitro. Like it really matters. Tell you what, you drink your alcohol and enjoy alllll those amazing gains. I find it funny how people find every way they can to defend something that destroys the liver among the other counterproductive things it inhibits towards fitness.


Do what you want and I'll do what I want. Best of luck in all of your future fitness endeavors.

"Like it really matters."? Bro, you in High School?

Arn't you a cheeky one. In vitro is all the scientific proof I need. That's just me, you enjoy your wine and I'll enjoy not having any alcohol. I'm not missing anything and evidently neither are you. It's my personal choice. I've read the studies and have posted them here, yet you discount them because they were in vitro. It may not be good enough for you, well that's fine but guess what? They're good enough for me. Good luck in all your fitness goals and I'm sure you'll pack on tons of lean mass.

BrentJulius

meh, most alcoholics are very skinny because they don't eat enough for days on end, although they tend to bloat in the face.

Alcohol does have 7 calories per gram but how it is metabolized is more complicated than that. If you believe that colories in vs. calories out are all to take into consideration when it comes to body composition..well. it isn't. Alcohol is not used as fuel, nor can it convert to glucose, glycogen or fat. Alcohol is a powerful diuretic and will dehydrate you pretty bad. The only good aspect after a night of drinking is that I'll have a more solid abs and be more vascular for a couple hours until I get back to homeostasis. You could definitely be bulking and have a beer a night, not for the alcohol , but the calories/carbs as long as you stick to a beer or 2, after that the benefits are eradicated by the alcohol.. It's full of electrolytes, b vitamins and has a positive effect on testosterone..

ninerbuff

Alcohol will cause you to gain weight but definitely not muscle. Alcohol eats away at muscle mass.

Wut? Where is the evidence for this?

A.C.E. Certified Personal/Group FitnessTrainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

scopetrek

Why not? Sure you will gain weight with alcohol...you will also die from cirrhosis of the liver if you abuse drinking for the sole purpose as a weight gainer. Need anymore reasons?

ECA67

My trainer told me that alcohol slows your metabolism.

buff_guyy

Alcohol is just terrible. Amadbro was right on with almost everything he mentioned in his previous posts.

heybales

My trainer told me that alcohol slows your metabolism.

They were wrong, speeds it up actually as the body tries to get rid of the toxin that is created from it. Read several posts that include what the body does when you drink.

nitepagan

To understand why Alcohol is so deadly for weight gain, one has to look at the chemical formula and/or chemical structure. Organic structures always are a carbon ring structure, around this ring structure are atoms of various types which define the chemical, most of the time it is an hydrogen atom. With alcohol one of those atoms or bonds are and the OH radical, radical, two atoms bound together as one unit. The OH radical is one atom of oxygen attached to one hydrogen atom. A bond is a connection between molecules in the chemical structure. So the alcohol molecules, the entire structure, I tried to explain is happy and makes people happy most of the time.

In the body, the alcohol molecule is treated like a poison, which in actuality it is, but people ignore that fact, because they like how it makes you feel. So now the body goes on alert and decides to make it into a more satisfying chemical substance. It sees that OH radical attacked to the alcohol molecule and thinks if I undo that OH radical and put something more pleasing there, then I will be happy, so that is what happens. With trading the OH radical with an atom of hydrogen this molecule becomes a molecule of sugar or glucose and the body has achieved happiness once again.

The body has side stepped all the hard work of breaking down the alcohol molecule into all it's component parts and reassembling it into something it needs. So now after a hard days night of drinking, the body slowly converts all this alcohol into glucose. Now the body is drowning in glucose, so what does it do, starts looking for places to stick the glucose, ahh, those fat cells are just around the corner.

After a couple days and the hangover is gone and the body is back in equilibrium, everything is back to normal or is it. The body has made an investment in energy storage, all that happy alcohol has been turned into glucose and stored in fat cells for future use.

So now what do you do, "Let's go out and have a few beers!!!" or is it "Lets go to the gym, I need to work off some of that fat that just appeared out of nowhere!!!".

eric_sg61

all that happy alcohol has been turned into glucose and stored in fat cells for future use.

Alcohol is turned into acetate which is burned off immediately by the liver. The body has no mechanism to store alcohol for future energy needs.