Recovery from endurance exercise - Rest

It’s common for athletes to romanticise ‘The struggle’ of training for a big season or event, characterized typically by big Ks, hard sessions and early mornings, dragging your ass out of bed before you’re done dreaming about Javier Gomez in his tight tri suit.  But this process of burning the candle at both ends can lead to long term mal-adaptation and actually lead to decrements in performance.

Rest

For an active person especially one who is mildly (or greatly) addicted to exercise, rest is not in your nature. For serious athlete’s hell bent on performance, the route to greatness is not through burying yourself in fatigue. Rest must exist at every stage of an exercise program, whether it be between training blocks, days, seasons or even within session rest. The objective should be to do as little as possible. (which will go against the nature of some).

If training output is sufficient, activity levels throughout the day should be limited for adequate recovery of fuel stores as well as muscular recovery. That means a low score of daily activity on your Fit-Bit will show that between sessions you were giving your body the best chance at recovery. Also you have too much disposable income. This may seem counter intuitive, and for some people in some professions, impossible (e.g. labour intensive jobs such as builders, cleaners or rodeo clown). But great athletic adaptations come from specific focused training and recovery, not burning Kilojoules all day long.

Sleep

Below are a few examples of how and why adequate sleep is an essential piece of the puzzle for performance and adaptation.

Decreased protein synthesis resulting in decrease in repair of damaged muscles and preventing the development of new muscle mass. This is due to a number of factors outlined below.  

Myofible (muscle cell) restoration -  During deep sleep (also known as Rapid eye movement sleep or REM sleep) the body has complete relaxation of the skeletal muscles and nervous system. This time allows for energy conservation and the restoration of muscles and connective tissue. (REM sleep is also the optimum time to draw on someone’s face in permanent marker)

Glucose metabolism – This deep sleep is also a time for replenishing glucose stores. It has been shown that sleep deprivation can decrease glucose metabolism by as much as 30-40%.

Hormones Responsible for regulating the body’s day to day functioning. Including metabolism (use of energy), growth & development and even indirectly, immune function. 

Sleep deprivation leads to the following changes to hormone levels.

↑ cortisol – stress hormone. High levels mean less protein synthesis = less muscle repair.
↓Testosterone – again leading to decreased rate of growth and repair.
↓ IGF-1  -  When this hormone binds to receptors it is an indication of muscle hypertrophy (increase in size)  

Immunological (big word) As you may be well aware, lack of sleep does play a role in immunity. interestingly sleeplessness is one of the key causes of man-flu.  

How?

-          An indirect result of stress related to hormone imbalance.

-          Shift in T-cell (immune specific cells) balance resulting in increased inflammation.  (This is only a theory to date. More research is needed.)

 Recommendations:

• Train the house down, but then put the feet up and rest. Separate training from daily activity.

• Take every opportunity to rest throughout the day, don’t stand when you can sit, don’t sit when you can lay down.

•   Adequate quality sleep is essential, every individual has a different ideal length of sleep however average recommended sleep is 7hrs per night (for general public.

• Naps can be useful to boost hormone levels in late afternoon, <30mins will prevent from falling into deep sleep and awaken feeling “groggy”. Also ingesting caffeine directly before will prevent this. (caffeine takes about 30 mins to kick in)

• Protein ingested before sleep is effectively digested and can improve muscular recovery. (glass of milk)

• Listen to your mother.

References:

Murat Yuksel, MD1Abdulkadir Yildiz, MD, Melike Demir, MD, Mehmet Z. Bilik, MD, Necdet Ozaydogdu, MD, Adem Aktan, MD, Ferhat Isik, MD, Suleyman Demir, MD, Umit C. Yazgan, MD,  Nizamettin Toprak, MD, 2014, Effect of Sleep Quality on Hemodynamic Response to Exercise and Heart Rate Recovery in Apparently Healthy Individuals, Clin Invest Med • Vol 37, no 6

PETER T. RES1, BART GROEN1, BART PENNINGS1, MILOU BEELEN1, GARETH A. WALLIS2,

ANNEMIE P. GIJSEN3, JOAN M. G. SENDEN3, and LUC J. C. VAN LOON, 2012, Protein Ingestion before Sleep Improves Post exercise Overnight Recovery, American College of Sports Medicine.

Penelope A. Bryant, John Trinder, and Nigel Curtis, 2004, SICK AND TIRED DOES SLEEP HAVE A VITAL ROLE IN THE IMMUNE SYSTEM?, NATURE REVIEWS IMMUNOLOGY, VOLUME 4

Hugh H. K, Fullagar, Sabrina Skorski, Rob Duffield, Daniel Hammes,  Aaron J. Coutts,

Tim Meyer, 2015, Sleep and Athletic Performance: The Effects of Sleep Loss

on Exercise Performance, and Physiological and Cognitive

Responses to Exercise, Sports Med, Vol: 45, pp:161–186

M. Dattilo, H.K.M. Antunes , A. Medeiros, M. Mônico Neto, H.S. Souza, S. Tufik,  M.T. de Mello, 2010, Sleep and muscle recovery: Endocrinological and molecular basis for a new and promising hypothesis, Medical Hypotheses Vol: 77, PP: 220–222

Damien Davenne (2009) Sleep of athletes – problems and possible

solutions, Biological Rhythm Research, Vol: 40:1, pp: 45-52

Sarah Kölling, Jürgen M. Steinacker, Stefan Endler, Alexander Ferrauti,

Tim Meyer & Michael Kellmann (2016) The longer the better: Sleep–wake patterns during

preparation of the World Rowing Junior Championships, Chronobiology International, Vol: 33:1,

pp: 73-84