You know what goes well with extreme physical exertion? Just like any other situation, the answer is beer. To that end, Sam Adams is developing the perfect product for the 2012 Boston Marathon.

In Boston today, The Boston Beer Co. will release “Sam Adams Boston 26.2 Brew.” From The Boston Globe:

The Boston Beer Co., best known for its Samuel Adams line of craft brews, said it is preparing a special commemorative beer to mark the 2012 Boston Marathon.

The company is planning to unveil “Samuel Adams Boston 26.2 Brew” at a news conference scheduled for Thursday at the Samuel Adams Brewery. At the conference, Boston Beer is expected to formally announce its first-ever partnership with the Boston Athletic Association, which manages the Boston Marathon.

The association’s Joann Flaminio and marathon veteran Bill Rodgers are expected to join Boston Beer founder Jim Koch at the event.

A quick bit of Googling tells us that a 150 pound runner will burn 100 calories per mile during a marathon, or roughly 2600 total calories. If the new Sam Adams marathon beer comes in at 160 calories per bottle, which is how many calories Sam Adams Boston Lager has, you’d be free to chug 16.25 beers, run the marathon, and not gain a pound.

Runners high, 16 beers, and no beer belly? Why not? It’s already been reported that non-alcoholic beer speeds marathon recovery.

From flickr user duane.schoon

The American Dietetic Association, which claims to be the “world’s largest organization of food and nutrition professionals,” is out promoting the health benefits of good beer.

While red wine is often touted as the heart-healthy libation, more evidence is showing beer has a great deal of nutrition and health-promoting qualities as well, according to an article published in the Winter 2011 issue of the American Dietetic Association’s member publication, ADA Times.

“Red wine enjoys a reputation for sophistication and health benefits, but as interest in artisan brewing gains momentum and emerging research reveals unique nutrition properties, beer is finding redemption not only as a classy libation with deep roots in many cultures, but as a beverage with benefits,” writes registered dietitian and ADA Spokesperson Andrea Giancoli.

Sure, you may get a bit of a beer gut if you over-do it, but there are clear health benefits to moderate beer drinking.  So be sure to drink one or two each — for your health.

From flickr user Bob B. Brown under a Creative Commons License

Wired writer Jonah Lehrer theorizes on why people who drink live longer (since we don’t brew beer to include antibiotics anymore).  Study after study has proven it so, but why?  As it turns out, it may not be the physiological effects of a drink, but the psychological and sociological.

But drinking isn’t just about de-stressing. In fact, the cultural traditions surrounding alcohol tend to emphasize a second, and perhaps even more important, function: socializing. For as long people have been fermenting things, they’ve been transforming the yeasty run-off into excuses for big parties. From Babylonian harvest festivals to the bacchanalias of Ancient Greece, alcohol has always been entangled with our get togethers. This is for obvious reasons: Alcohol is a delightful social lubricant, a liquid drug that is particularly good at erasing our inter-personal anxieties. And this might help explain why, according to the new study, moderate drinkers have more friends and higher quality “friend support” than abstainers. They’re also more likely to be married.

What does this have to do with longevity? In recent years, sociologists and epidemiologists have begun studying the long-term effects of loneliness. It turns out to be really dangerous. We are social primates, and when we’re cut off from the social network, we are more likely to die from just about everything (but especially heart disease). At this point, the link between abstinence and social isolation is merely hypothetical. But given the extensive history of group drinking – it’s what we do when we come together – it seems likely that drinking in moderation makes it easier for us develop and nurture relationships. And it these relationships that help keep us alive.

Drink beer, have fun, live longer: a simple and fantastic product of human evolution.

Credit: Emory

If you’re feeling sick, the last thing you usually want is alcohol.  But in ancient times, beer was your medicine.

A chemical analysis of the bones of ancient Nubians shows that they were regularly consuming tetracycline, most likely in their beer.

The finding is the strongest evidence yet that the art of making antibiotics, which officially dates to the discovery of penicillin in 1928, was common practice nearly 2,000 years ago.

…

Armelagos and his fellow researchers later tied the source of the antibiotic to the Nubian beer. The grain used to make the fermented gruel contained the soil bacteria streptomyces, which produces tetracycline.

A key question was whether only occasional batches of the ancient beer contained tetracycline, which would indicate accidental contamination with the bacteria.

I won’t pretend to understand the biochemistry behind it all, but if you’re interested, Futurity.org has it pretty well written.

105 year old woman (CARMINE GALASSO/THE RECORD)

If this is what makes you live to be 105, I’m in good shape.

But what may surprise most people, Fenton said, is her daily ritual, which she has sworn by since 1943.

“Three cans of Miller High Life a day and a shot of good booze at 5 p.m.,” Fenton said.

Her cocktail of choice is Johnnie Walker Blue.

The Miller High Life beer was recommended to Fenton in 1943 by her doctor, and it didn’t go down easily, she said.

“I almost cried. I said, ‘But Doctor, I don’t like beer,’ and he said, ‘You will learn to like it’ and I did,” she said.

There is so much amazing in this story it’s hard to know where to start.  She’s 105 and still drinks 3 High Lifes each day?  And a shot of Johnny Walker Blue? As prescribed by her doctor in 1943?  Whatever the case, I think we can all hope things work out like this for us.

He's been drinking beer

Well, sort of.  In a study by professors at the University of California, it was revealed that the levels of silicon found in beer are good for bone health.  Take that, Sally Field.

The silicon content of the beers ranged from 6.4 mg/L to 56.5 mg/L, with an average of 30 mg/L. Two beers are the equivalent of just under a half liter, so a person could get 30 mg of the nutrient from two beers. And while there is no official recommendation for daily silicon uptake, the researchers say, in the United States, individuals consume between 20 and 50 mg of silicon each day.

Not surprisingly, beers that use heartier ingredients have more silicon…

The silicon levels of beer types, on average:

• Indian Pale Ale (IPA): 41.2 mg/L
• Ales: 32.8 mg/L
• Pale Ale: 36.5 mg/L
• Sorghum: 27.3 mg/L
• Lagers: 23.7 mg/L
• Wheat: 18.9 mg/L
• Light lagers: 17.2 mg/L
• Non Alcoholic: 16.3 mg/L

The whole article is full of random chunks of interesting data, which, if nothing else, will make you feel better about choosing beer with your cereal over milk.