Restorative Sleep: The Secret to Recovery and Realizing the Win

by Melinda Burris Willms

Experts agree sleep is a basic component necessary for athletes to reach their optimum potential. Lack of adequate, quality sleep results in disappointing performance and ultimately, if the situation is not rectified, the athlete fails to reach his or her full potential. What follows is an in-depth discussion of the numerous ways lack of sleep affects the human ability to function—both physically and mentally—making it impossible for a person to perform well because they are compromised.

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The Important Role Sleep Plays in Conditioning and Recovery

In their 2016 article, “The Importance of Sleep for Athletic Performance,” authors and certified strength and conditioning specialists Geoff J.G. Marshall and Anthony N. Turner discuss the many factors that can contribute to poor sleeping habits among athletes participating in the full spectrum of sports’ training and competitions. The rigors of training are demanding by their very nature, focused and intense exercise designed to hone the body into peak physical condition while training the mind to concentrate on the task at hand despite innumerable distraction. Training is mentally and physically taxing, demanding that the mind and body work in unison to exceed previous personal bests to reach new heights of physical prowess.

To adequately recover from the physical and mental strain of these exertions, the body must have quality sleep to restore itself, a fundamental necessity if the athlete is to continue to grow in the training process and reap the maximum benefits of instruction. Marshall and Turner recommend coaches prioritize instilling the importance of establishing a regular sleep regimen with plenty of time set aside each night for an adequate amount of sleep in their student athletes. Doing so will enable the athletes to face the inherent stressors involved in hectic training and travel schedules as well as competition anxiety with more stamina and equilibrium.

Risks Associated with Lack of Sleep

Going without sleep can also have detrimental effects on your alertness level and severely impair reaction times. Fortius Sport & Health asserts research has shown that even “moderate sleep deprivation has been proved to have the same effect on reaction times as alcohol intoxication of 0.05% BAC [blood alcohol content].” This is an alarming statistic for the risk it poses for accidents alone, but for athletes, reaction times are key for successfully completing maneuvers, taking advantage of an opponent’s misstep, or being able to assist a teammate in a timely manner.

Sleep and Muscle Memory

For coaches, a vital part of training is drills, repeating core principles of the sport over and over so that athletes learn to do these things automatically, so that these fundamentals become second nature. This basic training concept is dependent on athletes getting adequate sleep. This is because sleep plays a major role in our mastery of new activities necessitating  motor coordination and skill.

According to Sound Sleep Health, neurobiological research has demonstrated a direct  “link between sleep and memory consolidation.” Studies have shown that following our learning a new task, while we sleep, the hippocampus is intensely active. Scientists point to this as evidence that the hippocampus continues working, firming up the associations with the new memory. In addition, when we learn something new, “neurons undergo a cascade of events that causes cell connections to be remodeled. This process, known as synaptic plasticity, makes it easier for a given connection to be stimulated in the future.” As a result, our muscle memories  merge, enabling us to execute these learned movements subconsciously.

Sleep is Essential for Hormone Release

            Reaching deep, restorative sleep is vital for athletic development because it is during the later stages of the sleep cycle that HGH, also known as the growth hormone is released by the endocrine system. Growth hormone is crucial for a variety body processes including muscle repair and building, bone growth, and stimulating fat oxidization. The production of growth hormone is vital for sustaining a high level of performance for the duration of your sports career. Deep sleep is also important because cortisone is controlled during these late phases of the sleep cycle. Fortius Sport & Health points out your body’s cortisol levels determine your body’s capability for digesting glucose; this is critical because endurance level is established by your body’s ability to “metabolize and synthesize glucose for later use.” This underscores the need for quality sleep, especially for athletes participating in high-endurance sports such as track.

Summary

• Sleep is a significant factor in recovery for strenuous exertions on multiple levels. Sleep aids in averting overtraining and is vital for rejuvenation after demanding physical and mental training exercises.
• Proper sleep is necessary for athletes to stay motivated. To fully absorb what coaches have to offer in the way of instruction, players must be awake to hear what they are being taught and must be driven to put those principles into practice.
• Deep, quality sleep is essential for the hippocampus part of the brain to do its job of absorbing and retaining new muscle memory so that we retain these skills and are able to automatically perform these tasks. This is essential for mastering the fundamentals of any sport.

Conclusion

            Get your rest and be kind to your body and mind. Remember all that you put them through in practice and how much your coach asks of you and how much you want from yourself. Don’t undermine all that hard work by attempting to work at that high level without setting aside the necessary recovery time. It won’t happen! Give your body the rest it needs so that when the moment comes, all that time and effort spent training will pay off when your mind and body work in unison to help you achieve what once seemed impossible come crunch time; you’ll be glad you did!

References

Bandesha, A. (23 June, 2017). 3 Reasons Why Sleep is Important for Athletic Performance.         Fortius Sport & Health.

Marshall, G.J.G., and Turner, A.N. (2016). The Importance of Sleep for Athletic Performance.     Strength and Conditioning Journal.

National Sleep Foundation (n.d.). Sleep, Athletic Performance, and Recovery.

Sound Sleep Health. (2017). The Importance of Sleep and Memory Consolidation.

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