How Quality Sleep Can Lead to Gains in the Gym!

By Coach Molly

We all know sleep is important but are we aware of exactly how a good night’s sleep can help us see better progress in the gym? If you are interested in understanding why, read on and we’ll dive into the fascinating world of sleep!

What happens to our bodies and minds when we sleep?

Even though we are asleep and seemingly unaware, our body and mind are hard at work making repairs and processing everything that has happened the day before. Sleep can often be underappreciated, but it is crucial for both physical and mental health. Sleep is when your body repairs, regenerates and prepares for peak performance. Let’s say you had a challenging workout at the gym earlier that day and you really pushed the intensity with heavier weights or higher volume. It is extra important to prioritize quality sleep that night because that is when your muscles repair themselves and grow stronger. Or perhaps, you are new to working out and your trainer taught you a bunch of new movements during your session. You wonder how you will be able to remember everything they’ve taught you! Well, good sleep not only repairs muscles but also helps with memory consolidation and learning new skills. 

What types of sleep are there?

There are generally 3 different stages during sleep. Light sleep is a transition stage between being awake and deeper sleep stages. It makes up about 45-55% of total sleep, and while it is not very restorative, it is crucial for transitioning to deeper sleep. 

Deep sleep or Slow Wave Sleep is the “physically restorative” stage. During deep sleep your body repairs tissues, builds muscle, and strengthens the immune system. It makes up about 13-23% of a person’s total sleep.

Rapid Eye Movement sleep (REM), known as the “mentally restorative” stage, is when memory consolidation and dreaming occur. REM accounts for about 20-25% of sleep and increases in length as the night progresses. If you track your sleep data, you should be aiming for a balance between the three different stages, with at least 30% of your sleep being in REM and Slow Wave Sleep to promote optimal recovery. 

Bad things happen when we don’t get enough sleep!

I know I’m not the only one who is especially grumpy and easily agitated after a night of poor sleep. But did you know that a lack of sleep can also affect your judgement, your ability to make concise decisions and can slow down your reaction time during high stress situations! High stress situations can often be experienced in the gym, on the field, or even at home. Whenever you are working out hard in the gym, are in the middle of a soccer game or handling a stressful situation at home, you may notice your heart rate elevating.  That would be considered a high stress situation and bad sleep the night before can negatively affect your ability to react in those crucial moments. Proper sleep has been linked to better performance in sports as well as daily activities such as working hard at school, performing well at your job, taking care of children and many more. 

Chronic sleep deprivation can also have serious negative health implications such as high blood pressure, heart disease, obesity and depression. If you are genetically predisposed to any of those ailments, then you are even more at risk! 

How exactly does sleep affect recovery?

Sleep is a major driver of recovery. It influences your body’s readiness to perform by affecting key physiological markers like Heart Rate Variability, Resting Heart Rate and Sleep Cycles. I bet most of you have heard of these terms, but you may wonder what they specifically mean. Heart Rate Variability (HRV) measures the variation in time between your heartbeats. It reflects how well your autonomic nervous system is balancing stress (sympathetic) and recovery (parasympathetic). Higher HRV often means better fitness, recovery and adaptability while a lower HRV could indicate stress, fatigue or overtraining. Poor sleep can lower HRV because it activates your sympathetic nervous system (stress response) and reduces parasympathetic recovery. Consistent poor sleep leads to less REM and Deep Sleep, and increased cortisol levels, which suppresses HRV. Irregular sleep schedules can also throw off your body’s natural rhythm and negatively impact HRV. 

Resting Heart Rate (RHR) is your average heart rate when you are not performing activities. During deep sleep (Slow Wave Sleep), your body is most relaxed and your RHR is at its lowest. Poor sleep or chronic sleep deprivation can raise your RHR and lead to increased stress and reduced recovery while consistent, high-quality sleep can help lower your RHR over time, leading to improvements in cardiovascular health. 

If you wake up after a really good night’s sleep feeling refreshed, awake and ready to take on the day, you most likely experienced quality time in both Deep Sleep as well as REM, both of which support recovery. But even with good sleep, other factors such as stress and certain lifestyle choices such as alcohol consumption or poor diet, can impact recovery. 

How much sleep do adults need?

Sleep is essential to living a healthy lifestyle. Not getting enough sleep can cause more than sleep tiredness. Chronic sleep deprivation can affect your health, memory, weight, and even your sex life. Sleep deprivation may impact your attention span, reaction time, judgement, and decision-making abilities. Long story short, sleep is super important. Adults generally need 7-9 hours of sleep each night, but everyone has different sleep needs based on their own physiology and different baselines. The amount of sleep you need is personal and depends on several factors.

Your daily activities can affect how much sleep you need at night. A day running around after kids, completing errands, commuting to and from work, working out or studying for a big test is going to require more sleep to maximize recovery than if you spent the day loafing on the couch watching Netflix. 

How do I boost my time in REM and Deep Sleep?

If you wake up not feeling rested even though you gave yourself plenty of time in bed, here are some helpful tips to try implementing into your daily routine. 

1. Stay Consistent: Try going to bed and waking up at similar times daily.
2. Limit Screens: Avoid screens before bed to reduce blue light exposure. If you need to use your computer or phone close to bed time, try wearing blue-light blocking glasses to limit the negative impact of blue-light on your body’s natural melatonin production. 
3. Relax: Consider activities like reading, meditation, stretching or using a sound machine to ease into sleep. Relaxing the body before bed can help promote a more efficient sleep. 
4. Hydrate Smartly: Drink enough water throughout the day but try to limit hydrating before bed.
5. Avoid Alcohol: Alcohol can disrupt REM and Slow Wave Sleep cycles.
6. If you can, avoid high-fat and high-sugar meals 2-3 hours before bedtime. Easily digestible carbohydrates and light proteins, such as bananas and cottage cheese, are good meals to have an hour or so before bedtime if you have a hard time falling asleep on an empty stomach.  

If you’ve never tracked your sleep before, it could be fun to purchase an affordable fitness tracker, such as Whoop or the Apple Watch, and see exactly how much restorative sleep you are getting! Then, once you have an idea of where you are, you can start setting goals to help you get to where you want to be. Quality sleep is just as crucial to seeing progress in the gym as working out or watching your nutrition, even though it is not necessarily what we think of first when trying to get those gains!