I’m just starting to play around with the idea of sleep plans for powerlifters, and I feel like this is something I should have been thinking about a long time ago. I think we all agree that sleep is essential (both duration and quality), but I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone talk seriously about a sleep plan, at least not in the context of powerlifting. What I’m going to do here is lay out why sleep is so important, and then the key variables that I think we should be focusing on to improve sleep. I’d love for you to share any thoughts you’ve had on sleep in the comment section below.
This post is aimed squarely at sleep as it relates to recovery and training; not crossing time zones in order to compete. This is intended to be the first in a series of three posts, covering sleep plans, assessing sleep deficits, and adjusting to new time zones (especially as it relates to competition.) I’ll link each of the posts as they’re finished.
Note that this post is not intended as medical advice. If you’re having serious sleep problems, you should see a doctor.
Kangaroos are jacked and sleep most of the day. Coincidence?
Why do we need to sleep?
Strangely, it doesn’t seem to be entirely clear why people need to sleep. The best answer I’ve managed to find so far has been because we get tired, which is entirely tautological. There are any number of gurus and zen monks or what-have-you claim to get by on 2 hours of sleep per night, only napping 20-minutes every few hours or whatever their specific protocol is, but the evidence in sports is clear - you perform best on at least 8 hours of sleep per night. Dr Cheri Mah, a sleep expert who works with pro teams in the NBA, NFL and so on claims there is no upper limit to how much sleep athletes can use. Obviously, that isn’t always practical, but it seems like aiming for 8 to 10 hours per night is a realistic goal.
I haven’t been able to find specific numbers for powerlifting, but some related data I have found…
Collegiate basketball players who increased their sleep by 110 minutes per night for 5 weeks increased their free throw percentage by 9%, 3-point field goal percentage by 9.2%, improved their reaction times, and shaved an average of 0.7 sec off their sprint time for 86 metres (strange distance, I know) [source]
MVA data across 160 student athletes shows the best indicator of likelihood of injury being hours of sleep per night; athletes sleeping less than 8 hours per night were 1.7 times more likely to be injured than those sleeping more than 8 hours per night. [source]
I could keep going, but I’ll stop there for now. Those probably don’t map exactly onto powerlifting, as reaction time and coordination play into powerlifting much less, but I think it’s fair to say that the link between sleep and performance is strong.
Factors in a plan
As I’ve been thinking about this, I’ve identified ten (10!) factors which I think are worth trying to control in order to improve sleep duration and quality, which is actually way more than I expected to find. In no particular order…
Duration
Like I said previously, it seems like you should be aiming for at least 8 hours of sleep. If you’re currently sleeping 5 hours or less, aiming for 8 hours or more immediately might not be feasible, so setting incremental goals of half-hour increases every two weeks or something similar might be of useful.
Room Temperature
Ideal room temperature for sleep seems to be 16 to 19° C (60 to 67 F) for most people, with some individual variation. That probably feels quite cold for most people, so again, don’t jump straight to it if it isn’t comfortable. If you can’t control the temperature exactly, a fan or a heater will likely go a long way.
Room Brightness
Dark is better. Invest in blackout curtains if you can (best $100 I’ve ever spent), or a face mask if you can’t. It’s seriously worth it. Unlike the first two points, it seems like you can see immediate benefits from this one.
Snoozing
Some people snooze their alarm 2 or 3 or 12 times before actually getting up. As comfortable as snoozing can be, if you’re snoozing that much, you’d probably get more benefit from sleeping that extra time instead, and getting up when your alarm actually goes off. Personally, I limit myself to one snooze per day.
Supplements
This is probably a little individual, but I’ve found melatonin, magnesium, and zinc to be useful as a pre-bed stack for sleep. I take them around 40 minutes before I go to sleep, and the difference is like night and day. I take 5 mg of melatonin, 550 mg of magnesium, and 15 mg of zinc, but you should scale for your own body weight. Note that there is not a linear dose-response relationship between these supplements and sleep quality! (i.e. doubling the doze doesn’t double your sleep quality.)
Note that ZMA gets a lot of hype, but is just a mix of magnesium, zinc, and vitamin B6. L-Theanine supplementation looks like it might be promising too, but I haven’t experimented with it personally.
This is my preferred melatonin (that’s an Amazon Affiliate link). For zinc and melatonin, I just ask for the highest dosed option at my local pharmacy (most supplements are woefully under-dosed).
Wind down time
Spending some unstimulated time winding down before bed has had a big impact on my sleep quality. I originally thought it was fine, but I’ve found just taking five minutes to do some stretching and cognitive offloading (next point) before turning out the light to be impactful. I’ve heard quotes of up to an hour being beneficial. This is also a great time to practice visualisation or meditation that you might be meaning to do. This time should probably be screen-free, but it has nothing to do with blue light (I suspect the whole blue light thing is rubbish), but more to do with the stimulation devices give.
Cognitive Offloading
If you’re anything like me, your mind is racing with things you want to remember for the next day or random thoughts you can’t get rid of when you lay down. Cognitive offloading is the process of taking some time to write all those thoughts down. That way, you won’t forget them, and the process of writing them down seems to be helpful in its own right (much the same way as telling someone about your problems feels like it alleviates them). I now keep a notebook and pencil beside my bed, and use my wind down time to note down anything on my mind.
Morning Routine
Morning routine is important for sleep because humans’ circadian rhythms are actually much longer than 24 hours; 25 to 27 hours being the typical range. A morning routine helps to reset your circadian rhythm and keep you in sync. Important factors for that sync are temperature, light and movements. A light walk in the sun when you get up is perfect, but it’s usually dark when I get up so I tell myself stumbling into a warm shower first thing in the morning is basically the same thing.
Caffeine Timing
Caffeine has a 5 or 6 hour half-life, which is quite long, so limiting caffeine before bed is probably a good idea. If you’re training in the evening, your pre-training caffeine should be your last, otherwise stopping caffeine 6 to 10 hours before your intended bed time will probably improve your sleep a lot.
Training Timing
Training is (unsurprisingly) stimulating. The research seems to show that you should finish training at least one hour before you go to bed, but in my experience that isn’t long enough. I’d shoot for at least 2 hours when possible (though of course, due to lifestyle factors, that isn’t always possible.)
Making a plan
Like training or nutrition, a sleeping plan should be tailored for you, and I suspect that any improvement is going to help at least a little. Start by taking stock of where you’re at - which of the above are you doing well on? Which ones aren’t you doing well on? If you’re an athlete who likes to push yourself, it’s probably tempting to pick all of the things and try to do them all at once, but that’s not how habits are formed. Pick one or two things to tweak at a time. Aside from duration, which is probably the most important, it likely doesn’t matter too much which factors you decide to play with first.
I hope you’ve found some of the above useful. Like I said in the introduction, I’m interested to hear your thoughts on sleeping plans for powerlifters. Have you had one before? What factors do you think are most important? Which ones have you played with?