For everyone that has ever been on a diet, you will know that a big night at your favourite bar or nightclub can absolutely destroy your weight loss ambitions (well at least for the weekend). Not only do beers, wines and spirits contain calories, they also increase appetite, meaning in all likely hood you will eat something you shouldn't on the way home.

Almost all western countries facing some kind of "obesity epidemic" which to be fair, bars and nightclubs do contribute to.

Below are the Western nations when it comes to obesity.

1. USA – 66.7%
2. Germany – 66.5%
3. Bosnia-Herzagovina – 62.9%
4. New Zealand – 62.7%
5. Israel – 61.9%

So how do you stick to that diet and maintain that sexy (or buff) figure. There are a few simple ways you can ensure and awesome night out at your favourite bar or nightclub without having to suffer the indignity of eating celery for the next week.

Low Carb Beer

Even the biggest beer enthusiasts can't taste the difference between full carb and low carb beer, so if you are looking to lose weight (or limit the damage of a big night at your favourite bar or nightclub) then drink this. Typically this has roughly 25% less calories than normal beer (check the bottle) but more importantly… has the same amount of alcohol.

Spirits

Spirits proportional to alcohol content have less calories. To work this out, we had to use some sophisticated maths, but basically a shot of vodka has about 20% less calories than a beer with the same amount of alcohol. Keep in mind however that if you then mix this with coke, lemonade or whatever, then the spirit becomes more calorie heavy. Our suggestion is to mix your drinks with soda… vodka and soda is pretty good.

Wine vs Champagne

Sorry to tell you this girls (don't shoot the messenger) but champagne contains about 85% more calories than wine. Whilst champagne is definitely a girl's best friend at bars and nightclubs around the world, when it comes to that diet, wine is the way to go. Incidentally there is not much difference between red and white wine.

So this list is enough to make even the most health bar and nightclub enthusiast cringe, however if you put this in perspective, you will find that drinking is not as bad as you might think. Below is a comparison of alcohol calorie content and our McDonalds to give you a better understanding.

1 Big Mac has 485 calories. This is equal to:

• 4 Glasses of wine.
• 4 vodka and diet coke
• 3 glasses of champagne
• About 1.5 Litres of beer

Furthermore, none of the drinks mentioned have any fat in them.

Interestingly enough, studies show that there is no direct correlation with drinking and weight loss. What this study determined was that heavy drinkers tend to have poorer diets then lighter drinkers and that it was the poorer diets that caused the weight gain. (However there are studies that challenge this)

So moral to the story is…. don't be too worried about having a big night at your favourite bar or nightclub , just make sure on the way home you walk straight past maccas…