sleep school: CAN EXERCISE HELP YOUR ZZZZ’S

Ah the elusive sleep! For many of us perhaps as parents of small children -or as we head into perimenopause and beyond, a part of our life that we never paid a second thought to suddenly becomes all consuming. Living on minimal sleep is torture. The question is – can exercise help? Our fitness expert Nikki Ellis says ‘absolutely YES’…

Exercise reduces insomnia and increases the amount of time we spend in deep sleep – the most restorative of the sleep phases.

Exercise can help regulate our Circadian rhythm making it easier to both fall asleep at night and wake up in the morning. This is especially true when we exercise outdoors in natural light. If you are going through your midlife transition getting some early morning sunlight on your bare eyes (sans sunglasses) is a great idea.

Exercise is also fabulous for decreasing stress and improving mood – great news for those of us who lie awake ruminating, worrying and list making!

Until quite recently experts have recommended cardiovascular exercise as the best sort of training to help us sleep at night, however a recent meta analysis of 24 different scientific papers showed that resistance training (weight training) was by far the most effective exercise modality in terms of increased sleep quality.

Other interventions such as improving nutrition and general physical activity also had a positive – but smaller – effect on quality of sleep.

Timing is everything…

Exercise does tend to make us more alert so training right before you hop into bed is not ideal, here are some suggestions:

Morning Workouts: As mentioned, morning workouts, especially in natural light help set your Circadian rhythm which can make it easier to sleep at night.

Afternoon: Body temperature and muscle function tends to peak in the afternoon which can lead to better performance (eg greater intensity of training) which can lead to greater fatigue and ease of getting to sleep. Training in the afternoon also gives you plenty of time to refuel and unwind prior to heading to bed.

Early evening: can still work fine as there is enough time for your body temperature and heart rate to return to normal before bed time.

Late evening: High intensity workouts closer to bed time generally make it harder to fall asleep due to increased heart rate, adrenaline and body temperature. If you feel like doing something late at night that won’t impact your sleep yoga, stretching or mobility is perfect.

If you are keen to get great results from your training – fitness, strength, power, muscle gain – then sleep is vital. It’s when our bodies repair and build muscle . Human Growth Hormone – essential for muscle recovery – is also released in our deep sleep phase. Good sleep also improves our cognitive function allowing us to stay focused and motivated during our workouts.

Have you heard of Whoop?

It’s a wearable device to monitor your stress, strain and recovery and is super useful for setting bedtimes and working out when is the best time to exercise, as well as telling you how much time you spend in the different sleep phases, it even tells you how many hours of sleep you’ve had versus how many hours of sleep you need – it’s a brilliant little tool for maximising performance. Click here for more details.

CONNECT

Nikki Ellis is a fitness expert with more than 30 years experience. She runs Cinch Fitness in Melbourne. For more details:
Visit her website: cinch.training/
Follow her on instagram: instagram.com/cinchtraining/

PHOTOS: Zara Home