Strength training helps with better sleep
Having sleep problems? Strength training can help, sports scientists at Appalachian State University in the US discovered. According to their study, doing strength training early in the morning helps you fall asleep earlier at night, and doing strength training later in the day reduces the number of times you wake up during the night.
Study
The researchers did experiments with 12 male and 12 female students, aged between 18 and 25. The researchers studied the subjects' sleep on four different occasions.
Results
The students slept better on days that they did strength training. When they trained early in the morning they fell asleep more quickly that evening. When they trained later in the day they woke up less frequently during the night. Strength training later in the day also reduced the number of minutes the students lay awake at night.
The researchers also monitored the students' blood pressure while they were sleeping. Strength training had no effect on this, however.
Conclusion
"Practitioners should urge clients who struggle to fall asleep to work out earlier in the morning, whereas those who struggle to stay asleep may benefit more from evening strength training sessions", the researchers wrote. "Stressing the sleep-enhancing advantages of resistance exercise is also critical."
"Those who do not regularly engage in aerobic exercise because of health or other limitations could improve their ability to maintain sleep and concomitantly limit the risk of developing adverse health conditions such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and depression, which have all been associated with poor or insufficient sleep, by incorporating resistance exercise into their weekly routines; this thus supports the role of exercise as an effective prophylactic health measure."
Source: J Strength Cond Res. 2015 May;29(5):1378-1385.
Having sleep problems? Strength training can help, sports scientists at Appalachian State University in the US discovered. According to their study, doing strength training early in the morning helps you fall asleep earlier at night, and doing strength training later in the day reduces the number of times you wake up during the night.
Study
The researchers did experiments with 12 male and 12 female students, aged between 18 and 25. The researchers studied the subjects' sleep on four different occasions.
- C = no strength training;
- 7A = strength training at 7 o'clock in the morning;
- 1P = strength training at 1 o'clock in the afternoon;
- 7P = strength training at 7 o'clock in the evening.
Results
The students slept better on days that they did strength training. When they trained early in the morning they fell asleep more quickly that evening. When they trained later in the day they woke up less frequently during the night. Strength training later in the day also reduced the number of minutes the students lay awake at night.
The researchers also monitored the students' blood pressure while they were sleeping. Strength training had no effect on this, however.
Conclusion
"Practitioners should urge clients who struggle to fall asleep to work out earlier in the morning, whereas those who struggle to stay asleep may benefit more from evening strength training sessions", the researchers wrote. "Stressing the sleep-enhancing advantages of resistance exercise is also critical."
"Those who do not regularly engage in aerobic exercise because of health or other limitations could improve their ability to maintain sleep and concomitantly limit the risk of developing adverse health conditions such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and depression, which have all been associated with poor or insufficient sleep, by incorporating resistance exercise into their weekly routines; this thus supports the role of exercise as an effective prophylactic health measure."
Source: J Strength Cond Res. 2015 May;29(5):1378-1385.
