The rate The effects of alcohol vary greatly from one person to the next, and in the same person from one day to the next. It takes two to three hours to completely metabolize one beer. Many factors significantly influence the rate of alcohol absorption and the effects of alcohol, including body weight, fatigue, if you've eaten, gender, medications, and history of drinking. Alcohol requires no digestion or preparation for absorption. It is rapidly absorbed when it is presented to the small bowel.
Food slows the process , diluting the alcohol and delaying gastric emptying while digestion occurs.
Four drinks in one hour without food will result in a very high blood alcohol level, while the same amount of alcohol with food, spread out over a four-hour period, will result in a much lower peak alcohol level. Both the peak concentration and the area under the curve of alcohol concentration over time will be lower in the slower drinker , since absorption occurs over a longer time period and metabolism of the alcohol will be occurring simultaneously. The larger the physical size of the drinker, the lower the blood alcohol level will be for a given amount of alcohol. Alcohol is metabolized by a series of reactions that begin in the digestive tract and continue in the liver. Rapidly ingesting alcohol skips this first attempt at detoxification of alcohol.