If you know me, you know I encourage balance. Balance of living a healthy lifestyle while still enjoying life and friends and not feeling like the odd man/woman out. The balance of eating "clean" but also fitting in those meals that we enjoy every now and then is important in my opinion. Not just important for our psyche so we don't go crazy while trying to live healthy, but also important for us to be able to feel "normal" if you will.
We're human. We have cravings, and we want to LIVE our lives without too many restrictions. I'm writing this to those of you who really want to stay on track but also want to be able to have a drink every now and then, which probably accounts for 85% or more of you I'd say. For those asking- How do I get drunk every weekend and still lose weight? Get out of here.
So the real questions that everyone wants to know the answers to:
-Can I lose body fat while drinking?
-Am I going to have to continue to stay in on a Friday night while my friends go grab dinner and drinks because I don't want to lose progress?
-How do I track alcohol into my macros? Is that even possible?
I've gotten these types of questions more times than I can keep track of. Most trainers or nutritionists will avoid these questions and just simply say no, but what does that solve? Nothing.
Let me say this first: I do not encourage drinking, but I definitely don't encourage it for those with a serious goal in mind or looking to lose weight in a certain time frame. If you are trying to LOSE weight, alcohol isn't going to do ANYTHING for you on the physical side. Sure, there are plenty of studies showing how a glass of red wine every so often can help reduce the risk of heart disease but people take that way too far. K, had to get that out of the way.
As a trainer it's my job to educate you on these kinds of topics as opposed to ignoring them. Kind of like a sex ed class. you can't stop the kids from doing it, so you might as well show them how to do it safely! So I'll tell you all the reasons why you probably shouldn't drink, and let you form your own opinion if you'd like to fit it in. I'm not here to give you a lecture on alcohol, but just hear me out.
In my research, I've seen little to zero physical benefits form it. Rather the opposite in the gran scheme of things. I'm not going to get all sciency (is that even a word?) on you, but I'll tell you this: Alcohol itself can't be stored as body fat, but it does block fat oxidation, and blunt protein synthesis while the body deals with processing the alcohol consumed. That's a lot of physiological info summed up for you, but you get the idea. It's not great.
On top of the negative physiological effects that drinking alcohol has, there's a few other mental and physical things to think about. How many times have you had one too many and didn't want to eat a slice of pizza, or 3, or a burger or fries? Exactly. When you're drinking you are more than likely not going to care that you have little to no macros left, and you make the choice you want in the moment. Then think about the next day. You wake up and think, I don't feel 100% today. your workout will also suffer because of that. Not just mentally, but physically it will hinder a solid performance in the gym. If that's worth it to you, then so be it.
We all know social experiences bring happiness. Not all events will have alcohol involved, but a lot of them do. Alcohol is a part of a lot of peoples lives and that's ok. BUT, like I said before, I promote balance.So this is not intended to sound like I condone drinking, its meant to show you guys that its possible to live this fitness lifestyle with balance (a little alcohol if you want). Im teaching you how to fit a little alcohol in here and there if you choose for a number of reasons.
Im not an idiot. I know some of you have been drinking as a part of your daily life. In fact I've seen it personally, in person or social media.
I want you to know how to incorporate it into your life if you choose while still reaching your fitness goals.
I don't want you to think that 1 or 2 drinks every now and then is completely destroying your progress because that leads to people giving up, and I hate quitters!
Ok, so now to the math part and to show you how to accurately account for alcohol in your macro budget. Just like carbs/protein have 4cals per gram and fat has 9cals per gram, alcohol has 7cals per gram. Alcohol is technically a 4th macronutrient. Im going to show you an easy trick to fit your drink into your macros without having to dip into ethanol percentages and take out a pen and paper just to drink your beer.
If you go into the 1st Phorm app and search Bud Light 12oz for example it will look like this:
6.6 grams of carbs? What? Isn't that only 26.4 calories? No. The macronutrient that the app doesn't account for is ethanol aka alcohol. So, in this case, 26 calories are carbs, and 84 of the calories from this beer are made up from alcohol.
So, the easiest way to track this into your macros is to let the app do the work for you, but if you want the breakdown specifically let me show you...
12 oz of this beer is 110 cal. Because we aren't counting alcohol as one of our macronutrients, and carbohydrates are the most flexible, all we need to do is manipulate our carb intake for the day if we chose to put this beer into our diet.
110 divided by 4 = 27.5 g of carbs
All you have to do to fit this beer in, is to take 27.5g away from your carbohydrates for that day. Easy enough. If you have two of those beers , take away 56g of carbs from your daily intake.
I can also tell you that if you love your carbs, and you would rather take your calories from your fat intake, you can. You just have to divide the total number of calories by 9 instead.
110 divided by 9 = 12.2g fat
SIDE NOTE: NEVER TAKE IT FROM YOUR PROTEIN.
Let me give you another example: Search your favorite vodka and something similar to this pops up...
Since a full shot is considered 1.5 fluid oz, lets go ahead and say there are 96 calories in that shot of vodka or in that vodka water since 64 x 1.5 = 96. To fit that into my macros, I just divide by 4, giving me 24g of carbs to take away from my daily intake.
One more example: lets say Crown Royal and diet ginger
A serving size of crown (1.5oz) is 96 calories. The diet ginger ale has 0 calories.
96 divided by 4 = 24
96 divided by 9 = 10
This means I can count that drink as 24g carbs or 10g of fat
So, to conclude this, I want you guys to know that it's possible to be "fit" and drink a few every now and then if you choose. Will it hinder or slow down your goals? It's possible. But everything has consequences. Enjoy your life. Balance your life. Everything is ok in moderation. Key word: MODERATION. Dont go buy a 6 pack and try to justify it to "fit your macros."
Hope this clears any questions up on the topic of alcohol & macros for you all!
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