In a very important recent scientific study, the researchers from the Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine investigated a bidirectional relation between sleep and physical exercise. So far, mainly the influence of exercise on sleep was studied. Here, the researchers extended their interests: they looked at the issue, how sleep influences exercises.
Overview of clinical study
They found no evidence that training has a direct influence on sleep. However, they found that sleep influences training. The subjects exercised shorter after a bad sleep.
Better sleep - better training!
In the longer time perspective, exercises increased the quality of sleep. It turned out that after 16 weeks of training, people who regularly exercised, slept 1,25 hours longer than their peers who did not train. Therefore, when starting physical trainings, don’t expect immediate effect in your sleep quality. It doesn’t work like this. Sleep improvement takes place gradually in this case and physical exercises help to maintain good sleep quality in the long run.
What deserves special attention when considering physical effort and sleep together is, after-training regeneration.
Human body, forced to fight with its own weaknesses, has to rest, relax and regenerate afterwards to the largest possible degree. In order to do this, it has to have best possible conditions.
Since during physical exercises, we strain our spine very much, we should take care about the proper regeneration of this main part of our skeleton.
A great role is played by the mattress on our bed, on which we spend the night. Taking into consideration the fact that we sleep the third part of the day and that we sleep after a tough training, when we add to training strains, the burden of our spine during sleep, we may expect unwell feelings and backaches – for a start.
How should the mattress look like to ensure sportsmen’s regeneration, even occasionally?
First of all, the so-called “point flexibility” is required, which is directly reflected in the spine relaxation. The thing is not to cause excessive bowing of our back during our body’s pressure on the specific mattress’s area. Only the pressing point may bow, nothing else.
It is worth your attention.
Orthopedic mattresses equipped with a rack is the best friend of a sportsman. One has to take care not only about regular exercise, but also about regular, relaxing sleep in the proper conditions. There is no other way, taking into consideration the fact that – according to the researchers – the relation between sleep and exercises is bidirectional.
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