I’ve never felt better than July and August 2025. I was training for my first marathon, running four or five times a week, eating right, getting enough sleep. Together, this all paints a pretty picture, and I think the assortment of positive changes was all inevitably feeding each other, accumulating in a consistent WHOOP recovery that was positively green with envy.
Of course, these were all things I had attempted before, setting earlier alarms, pushing myself on longer running slogs. But never together – and never without ditching the booze.
Now, this isn't a confession, but I realised I couldn't have both lifestyles at the same time.
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For as long as I've legally been able to order a pint at down my local I've always led a life centred around drinking and the subsequent culture. Weekends in the pub, late nights. It's usually lined up with a pint in hand. And I wondered why I never really took my fitness to the next level. Perhaps I always knew, but never really wanted to walk away from a lifestyle that I so thoroughly enjoyed.
That was, of course, until I booked myself into the Sydney Marathon. It gave me a target for the first time since leaving university, really – something to commit to and work towards.
I didn't know it then, but it would forever change my relationship with alcohol. And according to the latest data from the State of the Hops, Australia has never had more choice when they head to the bottle-o, with beer (full-strength, mid-strength, and zero alcohol) reaching an all-time high across BWS and Dan Murphy's.
The report, which draws on purchasing data from millions of BWS and Dan Murphy's shoppers, shows that non-alcoholic beer is now in its eleventh consecutive year of growth, and that nearly half of all non-alcoholic beer baskets also contain an alcoholic item.
It’s called "zebra striping", deliberately alternating between alcohol and non-alcs across a session. It sounds like a trend, but the data shows it’s sticking, driven largely by a generational shift in attitude.
Now, what’s interesting here is that these drinkers are coming up with more choice than ever, with a 165% growth in range over the last decade. That’s 2,312 beer products on the shelves. For the new generation, moderation is the new default.
Millennials are the Australian demographic that significantly over-indexes for craft beer, while Gen Z sits roughly at the national average. What Gen Z does reach for is low-carb, international premium, and, increasingly, culturally, Guinness, splitting the G more than any other group. It’s seen stout emerge as the fastest-growing category in Australia.
Clearly, the interest is in flavour and occasion, not volume.
Even if I arrived at it the hard way, I’m now deploying some more moderation in my drinking habits, thanks to the abundance of premium low and zero alcohol products on offer across the country.
Of course, after I crossed the finish line at the Opera House, I went straight to the Lord Nelson for a well-earned pint. It was in the Top 5 beers of my life (not that I could really name the other four) because I had earned it the hard way, after a slog of sobriety (and 42ks through the Sydney streets).
I'm not dry now, I should add – I don't think I need to be. But I'm certainly more deliberate about it, and now I feel equipped to actually use that choice, rather than just defaulting to the same thing out of habit. The emergence of new alternative brick-and-mortar sites like Heaps Normal opening within the heart of Australia’s craft beer capital makes life a lot easier, I admit.
The typical Aussie beer drinker, the data tells us, no longer exists. Good. I don't think I was a particularly healthy version of him anyway.
