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Benchmark Proactive Health - December 31, 2024
The holidays are a time for festive dinners, social gatherings, relaxation, and celebration. Quite often, all of these things are accompanied by alcohol: cocktails at the work party, beers for the football games, wine with dinner, champagne to ring in the new year, and so on. It tends to peak over the holidays, but year-round, alcohol is pervasive.
Despite long-held beliefs that some alcohol consumption is innocuous or even healthy, we now know that any amount of drinking negatively impacts our health. From a health perspective, cutting back (or better yet, quitting entirely) is the smart move. But many of us drink anyway, when other reasons take priority. Often we drink habitually due to social norms, and sometimes because of intense social pressure to partake.
A couple of Rich Roll podcasts made us reflect on this, and consider how moderate drinkers may benefit from a “time out” from alcohol. In “One Year, No Beer and Beyond with Andy Ramage” (May 26, 2019) and its follow-up “The INSANE Benefits of Going Alcohol Free,” Andy Ramage outlines his own experience in going from being a moderate drinker in a sales role that heavily encouraged it (very nearly required it), to living and promoting an alcohol-free lifestyle.
Andy did not consider himself alcohol-dependent or a “problem drinker”, but began drinking in his teens and continued to drink as many of us do: a few times a week with some bigger nights (in his case often spent entertaining clients). He felt he was always living with some effect of alcohol in his system, feeling chronically overtired, spending mornings shaking grogginess, and rarely feeling he was functioning at his optimum.
At age 35, Andy had a successful career in finance and was married with children but felt overweight, unfit, and unhealthy. He realized the root of his dissatisfaction was that he was not able to stick with goals consistently. He couldn’t get into a rhythm with meditation, exercise and eating well, and realized alcohol was playing a role. As an experiment, he decided to go 28 days without drinking. This required many, many attempts as he often succumbed to intense pressure from his colleagues and clients. Ultimately, though, he discovered just how much better he felt not drinking. Despite discouragement from peers and concern that he was jeopardizing his career as a salesperson who entertained clients, Andy ultimately decided to stop drinking for good.
Early on, Andy noticed opportunities to gain a competitive advantage in his job such as during lunchtime when other people were drinking and Friday mornings when the rest of the finance world was hungover. He became able to reliably show up as the best version of himself at work and at home and stay consistent in working toward his goals. With time, he has come to view his alcohol-free lifestyle, and the high performance it affords him, as a super power.
Many Benchmarkers have experienced first hand the negative impact that alcohol has on heart rate variability and sleep quality. Alcohol significantly reduces restorative sleep, which hurts our day to day productivity and general wellbeing. As Andy relates, feeling lethargic and in a mental fog all the time is not what middle age should feel like. He makes the point that abstaining from alcohol can be the catalyst to broader health commitments that may otherwise be hard to keep. Andy argues persuasively that even for the moderate drinkers at whom his message is aimed, alcohol limits one's performance, masks emotional issues we should be addressing directly and prevents us from accomplishing what we might without it.
To test this out for ourselves, Andy encourages moderate drinkers to try going 30 days without alcohol. The message is just to try - try taking a break and see how you feel. Andy emphasizes that the pressure to drink is so strong in our culture that taking on this challenge with others may be helpful. In doing so, he encourages people to focus on the daily wins (e.g., feeling a little better during the workout, having more energy, sleeping better). He also points out that one should be ok with multiple attempts at the challenge - just keep trying and appreciate the growth in every attempt.
In that spirit, we encourage you to consider how a break from alcohol might impact your own life for the better, and to join our Benchmark 30 Day No Alcohol Challenge starting January 1st (or as soon as you read this)!
If you'd like, email hello@mybenchmarkhealth.com with "I'm in!" for extra accountability, and in February we'll send swag to a randomly selected participant. We'd love to hear your impressions on the experience, your go-to NA drinks, tips for overcoming pressure, and anything else you learn along the way!
Highlights from Benchmark's community forum
Many of us have struggled with injuries that have kept us from the activities we love. If you’ve followed our Member Spotlights, you’ll recall injuries presenting a recurring problem for Bonar, and for both Ray and Lori, for example. I spent nearly all of 2024 with a foot injury that kept me from running. After 11 months off, I maintained more fitness than I expected, having focused mainly on weight training in the interim.
On the topic of time off, Mary shared an interesting study suggesting that a break in training may not be as detrimental as we fear and can, in fact, offer benefits. In the study, a 53 year-old competitive triathlete took 12 weeks off at the end of the season, then resumed training for the next 12 weeks. By the end of the retraining period, he regained and even exceeded his baseline level of cardiorespiratory fitness. In fact, nearly all variables improved vs. his pre-break baseline. His running economy and lean mass did remain slightly lower, highlighting the importance of focused efforts to maintain muscle.
This is one person’s experience, but it offers encouragement that an injury need not set us back as much as we fear, and in fact could help us adapt quickly and further improve upon return. If you’re sidelined, consider using the time to explore other activities, like strength training or trying new sports, and you may discover hidden rewards.
Kaitlin spent the holidays down under, visiting Australia with her family. She tried out the Timeshifter app to reduce the effects of jetlag and found it really helpful. Based on the details of your travel plans, it provides behavioral prompts to control various factors such as sleep, light exposure, and caffeine, to help your body transition to your new time zone as smoothly as possible. If you have big travel plans for 2025, download this one and give it a try.
Heather shared an article on consumers’ growing interest in wellness and top trends in the space. McKinsey considers the top 5 consumer trends to be: 1) at-home diagnostic testing (in the post-COVID era), 2) health & fitness wearables including tracking rings and continuous glucose monitors, 3) AI-enabled personalization of health guidance, 4) clinically-proven ingredients in favor of “clean” ingredients, and 5) increasing value of doctors’ recommendations.
McKinsey describes the biggest growth areas as: 1) women’s health, with greater investment in long-underserved topics such as menopause, 2) products and services for healthy aging and longevity, 3) weight management, including GLP-1 medications, 4) in-person fitness classes and personal training, 5) gut health, including probiotic foods & supplements, 6) sexual health products, and finally 7) sleep, where consumers report the most unmet needs, according to their research.
Last but not least, Kaitlin D. shared this Outside article about a recent study examining which factors best predict longevity. “The goal of self-measurement” the article explains, “is to scrutinize which factors truly predict longevity, so that you can try to change them before it’s too late.” Roger that. The referenced study analyzed data of more than 3,600 participants in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), tested at 50 to 80 years old, and followed over several years.
The study examined their activity data collected via wearables, along with 14 other risk factors (lifestyle factors, demographics, pre-existing medical conditions, and self-reported overall health), to see which were most predictive of longevity. The result? The top 3 most predictive factors were all related to their physical activity. Their level of activity was more influential on the length of their lives than any other factor examined, more than age, having diabetes or cancer, or smoking!!
Featured members and their health journeys
Ray and Lori completed their second Benchmark together, with renewed commitment to maintaining their active lifestyle. They’d dialed in their diet, intensified their workouts, and worked with their doctors to make changes, all of which led to significant gains. Their exploration and learning continues…more
NOTE: This newsletter is informational only; it is not medical advice. We have no stake in the products or brands we highlight here.
