Is there any time a beer tastes better than after a long bike ride? Despite the strong bond between bikes and beer, we still need to ask the question; What impact does drinking beer after a ride have on our performance?
In today’s journal club we’ll examine a new article about beer and exercise. Let’s jump in.
Wynne, J. L. and P. B. Wilson (2021). “Got Beer? A Systematic Review of Beer and Exercise.” Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab: 1-13.
We’ll start things off by taking a look at the primary questions this review paper set out to answer.
Review Questions
Performance
How does beer impact performance?
Adaptation
How does beer impact our adaptation to training?
Recovery
How does drinking beer after a ride impact recovery?
Being a review, this article set out to examine the findings of 15 previous studies that evaluated the relationship between beer and exercise.
In this graphic, we see the varying quality of each study included in the review.
In a practical sense, this spectrum of research quality means there is still much to learn about how alcohol may impact cycling performance.
While we won’t get into the details of each study in this review, we will take a closer look at the final one in the list above; Wijnen et al. (2016).
Here are a few highlights from the study:
References
- Wynne, J. L. and P. B. Wilson (2021). “Got Beer? A Systematic Review of Beer and Exercise.” Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab: 1-13.
- Wijnen, A. H., et al. (2016). “Post-Exercise Rehydration: Effect of Consumption of Beer with Varying Alcohol Content on Fluid Balance after Mild Dehydration.” Front Nutr 3: 45.
- Parr, E. B., et al. (2014). “Alcohol ingestion impairs maximal post-exercise rates of myofibrillar protein synthesis following a single bout of concurrent training.” PLoS ONE 9(2): e88384.