Alcohol drinks and sport activity

It is said for beer that it is good sports drink because it contains carbohydrates, potassium and B vitamins. This IS NOT TRUE due to following reasons:

1)      Alcohol will increase dehydration degree. If you drink beer after activity, you will go to the toilet more often and lose valuable water, instead of recharge it. Drinking beer before competition increases the possibility of dehydration during competition.

2)      Alcohol from beer can harm sports performance. If you drink beer before activity, you can be forced to give up due to bad performance or even due to hypoglycemic condition. Alcohol before the competition influents to the control of normal sugar level in blood.

3)      Beer is bad source of carbohydrates. From 150 calories of one beer can that contains 300ml of beer, only 50 calories comes from carbohydrates. Other calories come from alcohol. Muslces do not use alcohol as they use glycogen, so your carbohydrate load will not be possible from beer. Light beers even contain less carbohydrates. Here are info about carbohydrates in some alcohol drinks:

Drink	Amount	Total calories	Carbohydrate calories
86-% whiskey	0,4 dcl	105	---
94-% whiskey	0,4 dcl	115	---
100-% whiskey	0,4 dcl	125	---
Black wine	2 dcl	150	15
Rose wine	2 dcl	145	15
White wine	2 dcl	140	5

4)      Beer is bad source of B vitamin. To give recommended daily riboflavine values, you should drink 11 cans of beer, and a lot more to get other significant amounts of other B complex vitamins. If you plan to drink it after the race or activity, first drink two or three big glasses of water. After that drink only one or two beers(3dcl) and eat some carbohydrates – pretzels, pasta or cereal. If you are dehydrated, never drink beer, or any kind of alcohol drink on empty stomach. This will “hit you in the middle of the head”.

"Sports nutrition", Nancy Clark