Alcohol and Recovery from Injury

Don't know about the alcohol specifically, but if you are going to be on a steady diet of 4-6 drinks, you need to watch your weight. Added weight will make it harder to come back from an injury.

Are you trolling? Try getting a life. Lots of people lead very happy lives without ever exercising. Look at what they do. Don't wrap your identity in running.

There is lots of research out that there that seems to say that IT band is really just an inflammation of the fat pad on the lateral side of the knee. Alcohol causes inflammation of the brain in high doses. I'm no doctor. I'm no scientist. But common sense causes me to think that anything that causes inflammation of the brain would be bad for inflammation of the knee. Bodies parts don't work in isolation you know.

Would inflammation of the brain affect inflammation of the knee? I don't know much about these things. I could imagine that my body might have a limited supply of anti-inflammatories, so that some had to be diverted from my leg to help heal my inflamed brain, and this would slow healing for my IT Band. But, just because this seems to make sense doesn't mean it's true. I would be curious if anyone can cite some actual evidence.

I would also like to point out that I'm willing to bet that I'm not the only one here who has a tendency to take to drinking when suffering from an injury / running setback, so I feel that my question is both valid and useful.

Sad Runner wrote:

I would also like to point out that I'm willing to bet that I'm not the only one here who has a tendency to take to drinking when suffering from an injury / running setback, so I feel that my question is both valid and useful.

Maybe that's true, but over-drinking is not good for your health, therefore not god for your ITB. Yes, a few drinks a night is over-drinking. 2 drinks a night is the limit. Have a night or two out and then get serious about making it better. Not exercising is not the way. You need to get yourself to a gym and hit the bike, ellip, or whatever and get to strengthening and stretching your legs. Injury recovery takes more time than running so you have no time to drink.

Some evidence that the breakdown product of alcohol, acetaldehyde, causes muscular damage (which can't be good). Anyone know more?

Some google research has informed me that alcohol prevents the release of growth hormone, which I would think would slow recovery by inhibiting the protein creation necessary for muscle repairs. Also, it would make it hard to get stronger. I had never heard this before. Given that athletes take HGH to improve performance, this seems like a significant way in which alcohol would hurt athletic ability. I'd only ever heard vague reasons for why runners shouldn't drink too much; why don't people cite this fact more often? Or am I misunderstanding this? Maybe, for runners, inhibiting HGH release is good, since it prevents us from gaining unwanted muscle mass?

Alcohol as NO benefits on sporting performance.

Type in "alcohol effects on athletic performance" in google. Some interesting reading.

Anyone have any other input? I'm in the same boat- bone injury, out for 8 weeks.

Sad Runner wrote:

My question is, does alcohol consumption effect recovery?

yes. it makes you better faster

Alcohol has no health benefits except in small doses and slows down healing and performance

I'm speaking as a heavy drinker myself

One point,

. turning the question on its head

... Running and Aerobic activity will aid physical recovery from alcohol abuse

Time to drink wrote:

Anyone have any other input? I'm in the same boat- bone injury, out for 8 weeks.

It sucks. You want to toss back a few to deaden the "suckiness" of it all. So go ahead and feel sorry for yourself...for a little while. Take a week or so and wallow. After that, you gotta pull yourself out of the hole. Don't drink so much that you put on a quick 5 or 10 lbs because booze has lots of calories. Do something to take your mind off it. What exercise CAN you do? Core? Upper body? Can you turn yourself into a pullup machine in 8 weeks? Develop those guns? Change your focus, but whatever you do, don't fall in the hole so deep that you find it next to impossible to crawl out.

xcskier wrote:

Lots of people lead very happy lives without ever exercising. Look at what they do.

Lots of people lead happy lives without alcohol too....

OP, the alcohol is doing nothing but bad things.