Many new bodybuilding enthusiasts realize that they have to change their lifestyle if they want to become serious about building muscles.
This includes refraining from alcohol consumption because alcohol has many adverse effects on one’s ability to gain and maintain muscle mass.
This article discusses the five major ways alcohol can hurt your bodybuilding progress.
First, alcohol hinders protein synthesis. Drinking alcohol slows down the process of protein synthesis by about 20%. This presents a problem because your muscles are comprised of protein.
Second, alcohol consumption decreases testosterone in the body and increases estrogen. Testosterone, found in both men and women, is the key hormone that the body produces to build muscle.
The amount of testosterone a person has in their body determines how much muscle they can gain. And since women have considerably lower levels of testosterone than men do, they are already at a disadvantage.
Third, alcohol makes you dehydrated. When a person consumes alcohol, the kidneys have to work overtime to filter water throughout the body to break down the alcohol.
Water is very important to building muscles since muscles are made up of 70% water. If your body is dehydrated it does not have enough water in it to build muscle.
Fourth, alcohol causes the body to lose vitamins and minerals such as A, C, the B’s, calcium, zinc, and phosphorus. These vitamins and minerals are needed by your body to help it function properly, sustain muscle growth and maintenance.
And the last major problem that alcohol causes is that it increases the amount of fat the body stores. Alcohol is actually sugar and the sugar gets converted into fat if unused.
