Obviously it is ill-advised to work out when drunk but some weekends my friends and I get together at an early hour in the afternoon and I have not yet at that point had a chance to get a workout of any sort in. These are my true "cheat" days in that when I party with pals, I don't pay any attention to what I eat or drink and when I returned to my apartment I was pretty trashed and had consumed a ton of calories in the 4 hours or so that we had been at it.
While i do not advise that people work out drunk, I get some of my best burns in when I do this and I think I understand why.
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In the past I have written about how I would frequently go run a 5-10k after drinking beer for hours and on these runs, I kind of surprised myself about how much easier it was than it was when sober. This happened the first time because one of my friends at the bar tried to tell me "there's no way you could do a 10k now." I went and ran nearly 20k and went back to the bar after it to show the guy my Strava. My motivation was proving him wrong.
The other night I went to the small gym that is in my building at around 8pm and thankfully no one was in there as is normally the case. I proceeded to put on some heavy tunes that motivate me and then really hit the weights with a fury that I normally do not feel. I think I was actually more motivated to push through the pain than I normally would be because of the fact that I WAS drunk. I don't feel as though it inhibited me at all.
Think of it this way: When you are drunk you are more likely to do things that you wouldn't do like talk to a pretty girl, jump off of something stupid, or try to jump over a mailbox. This is because of the "liquid courage" that is in your bloodstream at the time.
I work out enough that it is actually quite difficult or me to accomplish getting sore the following day and for beginners this is a sign that you are overdoing it, for people that have been lifting for years this is a sensation that we want that shows us that we did enough, and it is also something that is difficult for us to achieve.
The fact that I didn't take any protein supplements pre or post workout probably negated a lot of what could have been some nice gains for me, but I had power in the gym at that time that I normally wouldn't have. I also was very stubborn and was in a fight against myself and pushed up 2 more reps on things that I normally would have given up on. This is the same sensation that I felt when my friend said I couldn't do the 10k drunk and I doubled it just to rub it in his face.
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This is something that I will likely do in the future again but with a protein shake following it. If you work out and also drink, you may wish to try it someday but here is a tip to not injure yourself. Use the machines and for god's sake do not overload on a free-weight press or something like that. I did drop sets and aimed for high reps and felt like I had really done something special the following day.
Since I like to drink anyway, this could be my new "thing"
I'm not expert but I know what works for me. I lost over 50 lbs in my 40's and love it when people tell me what I "can't do."