San Francisco Loses Drinking Contest to Fresno

flickr/Big Kohuna

No, really. We like to drink.

​When it came to our attention that Men's Health magazine had named Fresno the drunkest city in the U.S. in their annual ranking of cities by sobriety, we immediately wondered, wither S.F.? After all, we like a drink as much as the next person, even if it is an herbal digestif.

The answer will probably drive you to drink.

Out of the 100 cities ranked, San Francisco clocked in at a paltry 86th. Oakland landed the 75th spot. Berkeley didn't even make the list. Although if Men's Health had taken into account all the alcohol-tinged kambucha's chugged in that locale, the city probably would have made an impressive showing. (To be fair, the first article that greeted us when we visited the Men's Health' Web site was "5 Ways to Leave Her Begging For More", which made us immediately suspect of all other articles.)


In addition to getting drank under the table by Fresno, two other California cities placed in the top-10: Riverside and Bakersfield. If you have ever been to either of these places, you know why.

The cities are ranked using data like death rates from alcohol-related car crashes, frequency of binge-drinking in the past 30 days, and number of DUI arrests. So essentially, the numbers reflect how stupid drunks are in a given city, not how drunk they actually are.

So congratulations San Francisco! Our drunks are savvier than other drunks. Let's drink to that!