Healthy sleep resp. sleep duration are influencing the physical performance. Especially for athletes it is important that the body is able to regenerate after a strenuous training session.
Different studies of the Stanford University showed that the physical performance of athletes who slept too less is impaired. Our body needs sufficient sleep to relax from the daily efforts. This especially applies for athletes whose bodies are heavily strained by their training. When the body is not getting enough rest the athletic performance will suffer.
Sleep scientist Cherry D. Mah of the Stanford University has payed attention to the amount of sleep. With athletes of the university, she wanted to find out the influence of the sleeping quantity on their athletic performance, reaction time and the mood during the day. She assumed that independent from the kind of sport more sleep is directly influencing the performance of the athletes.
Amongst others, Cherry D. Mah conducted examinations with female tennis players of the Stanford University. Here, they had to test for five weeks to sleep ten hours per night. After these five weeks the sleep scientist noted that the players who were able to increase their sleep duration to ten hours were able to run faster and to hit the ball more exactly than with their former sleeping rhythm.
Cherry D. Mah already had done two studies with swimmers and male basketball players of the university, before. Here, she also was able to observe that a little bit more of sleep for a couple of weeks increased the performance, mood and reactivity of the athletes. The basketball players who slept about ten hours noticeably run faster and their hit rate increased. This leads to the conclusion that sleep is a decisive criteria for sporting success and athletic performance.
Due to their full schedule and necessary frequent journeys especially professional and active athletes often have too less sleep. According to Mah this leads to an impairment of the performance as well as the cognitive abilities, the mood and reactivity. Thus, for athletes it is important to pay as much attention to sufficient sleep as to training and well balanced diet.
Why does sleep matter?
Healthy sleep is important for regeneration of body and for our well-being. Sleep scientists assume that during sleep more growth hormones are produced. Growth hormones stimulate muscle growth and are responsible for repair of little muscle-injuries. Furthermore, fat burning as well as formation of bones take place. Now, when you are sleeping too less the production of the growth hormones is inhibited. Also, newly trained movement patterns are saved during sleep.
How much sleep does an athlete need?
The average sleep duration of an adult is between six and eight hours. It is not quite clear how much sleep an athlete needs. According to Mah you are having sufficient sleep when you fall asleep within 20 minutes and wake up at the right time without any alarm clock. When you are falling asleep right away and need an alarm clock for waking up your sleep duration is too short.
When an athlete is not able to sleep the day before a competition you don’t have to worry. Just one night with too less sleep is no problem. But, you should take care to increase your personal sleep duration a couple of weeks before competition. Furthermore it is important to stick to a regular sleeping rhythm.
Imagesource: @fotolia
This post is also available in / Diesen Beitrag gibt es auch in:
German
Leave a Reply