Parker Livecast Special: DUI Workshop at Roadrunner

Have you ever wondered what your real alcohol tolerance is, what your blood alcohol content (BAC) may look like after a typical night out at a bar, or how much it’s safe to consume before you get behind the wheel or a car or boat?

With the help of the La Paz County Sheriff’s Lieutenant Curt Bagby, we tested that tolerance with 4 volunteers at Roadrunner Floating Dock Bar on the Parker Strip.

Years ago in the Parker area, Sheriff’s deputies would train for DUI enforcement with volunteers from the community. People would drink a pre-determined quantity of alcohol and deputies would use various techniques and breathalyzers to judge their impairment under the law. Sometimes people could ‘hold their liquor’ and not show signs of impairment, but still be over the legal limit. Other people would show signs of impairment but not be over .08, in which case they could still be arrested for being ‘impaired to the slightest degree’. Other times people would know their limits, and be unimpaired and under the limit, and therefore within the law.

As the weather warms up and the Parker area demographics change in their annual way, parties for Spring Break, Memorial Day and the start of summer encourages more alcohol use. This special edition of the Parker Livecast was recorded at Roadrunner Floating Dock Bar & Restaurant, where Jeff was kind enough to sponsor the podcast in the interests of education and promoting safety with alcohol.

The cast includes 4 volunteers, 2 bartenders, Sheriff’s Lieutenant Curt Bagby and Roadrunner owner Jeff McCormack, who was curious about his own tolerance also. We tested at certain intervals and recorded the time since the podcast began, how our volunteers felt (in a rating out of 10), their blood alcohol content (BAC) and approximately how many drinks they had consumed by that point. The results, as you’ll hear, are interesting, and we’ve published a chart here too for your interest.

As the results show, everybody reacts differently to alcohol. Some feel it quickly and show immediate signs of impairment, even while technically under the legal driving limit. Others peak quickly and then slowly come down. Others take a while to show blood alcohol elevation, even having been obviously impaired for a while.

One thing we didn’t talk about much on the episode is body weight/composition. Josh is a big guy, and John is a small guy. That will change alcohol tolerance and may help explain some of the divergent results in the chart.

Also included:

• Can alcohol be a part of a healthy lifestyle?
• How can a DUI affect your insurance rates?
• What are the signs of alcohol impairment?
• How does this affect bartenders in their work?

Listeners will be able to tell that we ended up having a lot of fun, which is often the case at a bar like Roadrunner. But fun can be disarming and can encourage reckless behavior and unwise judgment. So the message out of this episode of the Parker Livecast is ultimately a very familiar one: Don’t drink and drive!

Special thanks to Roadrunner Resort and owner Jeff McCormack, bartenders Christina Holt and Isaac Sac Taylor, La Paz County Sheriff and Lieutenant Curt Bagby, Melissa Wright, Jennifer Griffis and Josh Savino.

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