You’ve cut fat and sugar, you’re exercising regularly, and you can’t help but notice that still, that bit of extra weight is not exactly melting off… so, if you’re being honest with yourself, is there maybe one more lifestyle choice that could zap away those unwanted pounds, if you’d be willing to try it? There is, according to a team of food science researchers who have determined how much alcohol affects your ability to lose weight. It’s not just the calories, people—there’s deeper science behind why drinking is a weight-loss foe.

Keep reading to learn how much alcohol these nutrition pros say you can have and still lose weight. Also, don’t miss What Happens To Your Liver When You Drink Beer.

Recently, a team of nutrition and food science researchers representing universities, clinics, and hospitals throughout Spain collaborated to review what they say were “all prospective clinical studies and systematic reviews” that analyzed the health effects of beer published between January 2007 and April 2020. Their exhaustive analysis of these 13 years of past studies, recently published in the peer-reviewed journal Nutrients, also included some alcoholic drinks other than beer (such as wine), as well as non-alcoholic beer.

RELATED: Here’s What Happens To Your Body If You Drink Alcohol Every Day

The research team was invested in understanding the health effects of beer and other alcoholic drinks because, they say, “In recent years, there has been an increasing interest in the potential health-related effects of moderate alcohol consumption.” So, their work examined “beer-associated effects on cardiovascular and metabolic risk factors to identify a consumption level that can be considered ‘moderate.'”

RELATED: The 3 Best Drinks to Speed Up Your Metabolism, According to Experts

The team uncovered some groundbreaking findings about the effects of alcohol on overall health—you can read the list in 4 Major Effects Drinking Beer Has on Your Health, New Study Says. (Yes, they say: In some ways, drinking can have positive effects on one’s health.)

You might already recognize that the relationship between what we eat and our overall health is inseparable. Not only does healthy food deliver nutrients that nourish the body, but being overweight can lead to discomfort, pain, and actual health problems associated with the heart, metabolic disorders (such as diabetes), and more.

(On this topic, check out Sure Signs You May Be Getting Diabetes, Says CDC.)

The researchers found that if you want to lose weight and still enjoy the occasional sip, there’s a particular amount of alcohol that will allow you to do that. From their analysis, they state that beer “seems to have a direct effect on weight gain, and on waist circumference in men.” That much, you probably already had a hunch about. However, they say that daily amounts of beer greater than or equal to 500 milliliters—that is, about 16.9 ounces—increase the risk of not losing weight.

RELATED: These Are America’s 6 Favorite Cheap Beers, New Data Says

Certainly, the calories and other macros in beer and alcoholic drinks all add up within your daily intake. But also, science is increasingly showing that what we eat affects the gut microbiome in a way that can often impact weight loss. It’s not just about “weight”: It’s that some foods inhibit our body’s ability to use food and drinks as fuel, while other foods help to facilitate that process. (Read The Secret to Avoiding Obesity May Lie in Your Gut, Says New Study.)

The researchers in this study found that when alcohol did yield a beneficial health effect, such as when the antioxidants in beer seemed to promote cardiovascular health, the amount of alcohol the study participants had consumed was really small—in some cases, less than one ounce.

So while from person to person such a small serving may or may not be enough to satisfy that sipping feeling, these findings definitely suggest that if losing weight has been a struggle but you’re still drinking regularly, then it might be time to get real about the role alcohol is playing in what you see when you step on the scale.

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If you find exercise simply too much of a chore, you’ll be interested in a new military-led study whose findings were recently published in the Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research, which sought to answer perhaps the single biggest question that those who prefer to live a more sedentary lifestyle have been asking for eons: “What is the bare minimum amount of exercise one needs to do to keep ‘fit?'” Read on for the clear answer provided by the study. And for more news from the front lines of science, see why This Super-Quick Workout Is Scientifically Proven to Work, According to the Mayo Clinic.

Finding a benchmark minimum for exercise is obviously relevant for those who serve in the military—and especially for the personnel who are deployed overseas and may find that they don’t have as much time to log in the weight room. As such, the study was led by Barry Spiering, formerly Nike’s research director, who oversaw a group of researchers at the United States Army Institute of Environmental Medicine. Ultimately, the researchers loosely define keeping fit as “preserving endurance and strength.”

There are three main fitness components that the researchers highlighted: how often people should train, the volume of the training (distance, reps), and how intense those sessions are. The experts reviewed a series of previously conducted studies for answers.

“In general populations, endurance performance can be maintained for up to 15 weeks when training frequency is reduced to as little as 2 sessions per week or when exercise volume is reduced by 33-66% (as low as 13-26 minutes per session), as long as exercise intensity (exercising heart rate) is maintained,” concludes the study.

So, if you like to run or swim for cardio, Spiering and team say that you only need to lace up your shoes—or put on your swimsuit—twice a week for less than half-an-hour at a time. Also, while you can bring down your frequency and your reps, you shouldn’t shirk the intensity. If you’re working out for 13 minutes, make it count.

“Strength and muscle size (at least in younger populations) can be maintained for up to 32 weeks with as little as 1 session of strength training per week and 1 set per exercise, as long as exercise intensity (relative load) is maintained,” concludes the study. “Whereas, in older populations, maintaining muscle size may require up to 2 sessions per week and 2-3 sets per exercise, while maintaining exercise intensity.” And for more fitness news, see Why Everyone Is Going Crazy Over This Viral Walking Workout.

The researchers observed that one of the three aforementioned components was the most important when it comes to maintaining a bare minimum for fitness: exercise intensity. “Our primary conclusion is that exercise intensity seems to be the key variable for maintaining physical performance over time, despite relatively large reductions in exercise frequency and volume.”

So if you’re only hitting the gym one or twice a week for a small amount of time, you need to maximize that time by keeping the intensity of your workouts high.

Remember, the point of the study is not to see how much exercise people need to do to be fitter. Rather, it was to pinpoint exactly how much exercise is required to maintain a healthy state of endurance and strength. This is about finding a “bare minimum.”

With this benchmark in mind, you can take steps to actually grow your strength and fitness levels, and improve your health. If you only need two days a week to maintain your endurance levels, you can grow from there. If time is an issue—and it always is—remember that there are plenty of reasons why high-intensity interval training (HIIT) is such a popular way to train and keep fit. Vigorous bursts of exercise test your muscles, your heart, and your lungs, and science has proven that—when contained to reasonable lengths—it totally works. But let’s face it: The single biggest benefit to short bursts of training is arguably the fact that they’re short bursts. Why camp out at the gym for hours when you can reap the benefits in 10 minutes or less? For further proof, see why This Workout Drives 29 Percent More Fat Loss, According to Science.

Read on for More Great Workouts from Eat This, Not That!

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