Under the Influence

Do you know how alcohol affects exercise?

If you enjoy a "tall cool one" after a workout, you're hardly alone. Drinking alcohol is not only an accepted part of the American lifestyle (about 70 percent of adults drink regularly averaging 2.7 gallons of alcoholic beverages a year), it's also closely tied to sports and outdoor physical activity.

Alcohol ads target viewers of football, basketball, and other sporting events. Dozens of former athletes endorse different brands of beer. Television advertisements are filled with images of young, healthy people playing sports and then downing a few.

Do you know how alcohol affects exercise? Is beer a good post-game replacement fluid? Does the occasional drink cause you any harm?

We may like the taste of Chablis or the way a few beers make us feel, but alcohol is detrimental to many aspects of physical activity. Initially it may make us feel less inhibited, more stimulated and "ready to party".

The good feeling, though, is fleeting - alcohol actually works as a depressant.

Furthermore, it has no significant beneficial effect on any organ of the body. According to the American College of Sports Medicine, alcohol will not improve muscular work capacity and may impede athletic performance.

How High?

The intoxicating ingredient is ethanol, a chemical compound that originates from the fermentation of grains. From the moment it enters the body ethanol receives special treatment. It rapidly diffuses from the walls of the stomach into the circulatory system and then to the liver or brain. Since the liver can handle only a small amount of alcohol at any one time, the rest goes directly to the brain.

The effects of alcohol on the brain are felt quite rapidly especially if the stomach is empty; food may lessen the pace of absorption. Alcohol first affects the brain's frontal lobes, the reasoning centers, sedating the inhibitory nerves. Higher levels of alcohol then affect the centers of speech, vision, motor control and eventually consciousness.

What other effects does alcohol have on the body?

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Table of Contents

Foreword: Billie Jean King

Comments by Barb Harris
Editor in Chief,
Shape Magazine

General Health
Nutrition
Exercise
Common Medical Problems
Dental Health
Emergency!
Infectious Disease
Sexual Health
Emotional Well-Being
Eating Disorders
Alcohol & Other Drugs
Environmental Health
Prevention