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Sunday, November 8, 2009

Alcohol Can Ruin Your Workout!


With more people trying to fight obesity and get the perfect physique working out has become a way of life. Many employers offer their employees and their family member's free membership as incentives to their new and potential workers. Quite a few colleges also offer state of the art gym facilities to both students and faculties alike. The problem is many people who work out regularly think that exercise will not be affected by alcohol consumption.

For some people the occasional happy hour or holiday cocktail will have no affect on a work out routine. The problems start to arise when casual drinking becomes a habit. Excessive alcohol consumption causes medical problems which can severely inhibit the most well thought out work out routine.

Most serious exercisers do not realize that drinking can completely negate all of their hard work. Quite a few college students and young men who make a practice of drinking nights and weekends do not understand why their muscle building work out routine is not working. The problem is caused by the fact that alcohol ultimately dehydrates the body.

In order to build muscle mass the body needs water. With out proper hydration muscle can not be created and it certainly can not be maintained. The dehydration caused by excessive alcohol consumption eventually leads to muscle damage that prevents the muscles from continuing the growth that work outs aimed at muscle growth promote.

Some might notice that they are feeling the effects of dehydration immediately after their work out. These symptoms usually include severe headaches, weakness, and thirst that can not be quenched by anything other than water. Those who eventually connect the dehydration with their work out will not make the further leap from exercising to alcohol. If anything these people working out and then drinking will proceed their alcohol consumption with water consumption which will really have next to no affect on the overall dehydration situation.

As the dehydration caused by alcohol becomes more severe the muscle growth will not only stop, it will start to degenerate. Usually the body burns fat during a work out, even if the work out is designed to promote muscle growth. When dehydration occurs because of alcohol the body will begin using, and burning, muscle for energy during a work out.

Not only will the work out start causing someone to actually lose muscle mass it is entirely possible that someone consuming large amounts of alcohol will begin actually gaining weight in the form of fat. Alcohol contains many empty calories that stop being burned because of the dehydration. While muscle mass is burned and body fat remains it is easy for people attempting to gain a muscular body to instead gain weight but no muscle. Cutting out alcohol, or at least limiting it, is a great way to get the most out of any work out. Those who work out to gain, and tone, muscle mass almost instantly notice better results once they cut alcohol consumption from their daily or weekly routine.

Source: ezinearticles.com

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