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Have Don’t Snooze, Your Say You Lose to THE EXPERT: IAN DUNICAN
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Ian Dunican is a PhD student at the AIS who is studying the effects of sleep on the performance of elite athletes — in particular, the link between electronic device usage and sleep, and the time required by elite boxers to adapt to a new time zone following international flight. Dunican’s research comes from a place of experience: he trains at the Academy of Mixed Martial Arts in Perth, where he’s earned a BJJ Blue-belt, and he also runs ultramarathons. Dunican also has extensive experience in the corporate world, most recently working in human performance, health, safety and risk management for Rio Tinto.
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even-to-eight hours per day is considered an adequate amount of sleep for an average person to function optimally — is it the same for an athlete who is in the midst of an intense training camp or is about to compete? Seven or eight hours of sleep per day is fine for the general population, but a study by Cheri Mah in 2009-10, shows that the extension of sleep in athletes actually leads to better performance. Athletes who got nine-to-10 hours’ sleep actually performed better on a range of tasks the next day, such as reaction time, accuracy and so on. Mainly this was done in basketball and swimming (basketball shots and swimming over a 50-metre distance) but there was some research done in judo late last year, looking at sleep deprivation and the effect performance had on using the hand-grip, and a sleep test that shows a variation in performance with reduction in sleep hours over a success of nights. Athletes should be getting between eight and 10 hours’ sleep in a 24-hour period when they are training heavily or in multi-day competitions. The more sleep an athlete gets, the more likely they are to recover because they achieve all various stages of sleep (stage one, two and three, including REM, or ‘rapid eye-movement’, sleep) and these stages are very important for different things such as growth hormone release, physical recovery and mental recovery. When an athlete’s sleep is compromised due to the timing and/ or nerves of competition, what aspects of performance are most likely to be affected and what steps can they take to lessen this during a tournament? It’s going to affect them in a couple of different ways if athletes are missing out on all the stages of sleep over at least eight hours. These stages are broken up into
different things such as non-REM and REM sleep: non-REM is important for physical recovery, as during this time we have growth hormone being released; during REM there is a sort of rehabilitation and improvement in memory overnight — like doing a backup of your hard drive. If you are waking extremely early, say, between 4am and 7am, you’re breaking those REM cycles. So, depending on the variation in sleep the night before, it’s going to result in a different performance. If an athlete is not achieving enough non-REM sleep, through stages one, two and three, then their physical performance is going to be affected. They’re going to be lethargic and may be unable to respond effectively. From a mental perspective, if athletes are not getting enough REM sleep, then mentally they’re not going to be on-point on that day. In the grappling arts, such as judo, jujitsu and wrestling, for example, strategy may suffer; in competitions such as karate or boxing, where decision-making at a very quick pace is required, we will see this effect being more pronounced in deterioration of performance due to lack of REM sleep. We can combat this by ‘sleep banking’. For example, if we know we’re going to have a competition on a Thursday, we try to get as much adequate sleep over the fiveto-10 days before that, and extended sleep if possible. If an athlete can nap during the day as well, this helps to achieve more sleep within the 24-hour period. If you’ve had a bad night’s sleep the night before, maybe look at the strategic use of caffeine through coffee, chocolate, tea, etc. if the rules of the competition allow caffeine as a ‘performance enhancement’. But caution should also be taken so as to not affect subsequent nights’ sleep if it’s a multi-day competition, as excessive caffeine use can lead to deterioration in the sleep required for recovery from an event.
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Do you have any tips for those who have trouble sleeping before a competition due to the increased mental and physical activity? Sleep banking, building up that sleep reservoir for successive days, would definitely help, as will the avoidance of electronic devices before you go to bed — at least for one hour, preferably two — the night before a competition. Something easy to read in print or on a Kindle, which doesn’t have any background light, would be preferable. Reducing the amount of light exposure helps with sleep onset. Block out light so as not to get woken early, particularly in
areas where they do not have daylight savings, as you’re going to have light creep in at 4 or 5am. If your room lacks heavy, dark curtains, use an eye mask. The other cheap alternative is a roll of aluminium foil — tape this to your window to stop the light coming in. Make sure your room is a comfortable temperature, somewhere between 18 and 25 degrees. Generally, men like it cooler than women, so having the room temperature set to a comfortable level for the individual is key as well. Also avoid heavy meals, caffeine, alcohol and so on the night before competition. Many people think that alcohol will help you sleep, but while it may
promote sleep onset, it’s going to lead to more awakenings two or three hours into the night and lead you to urinate more frequently as well. So, comfort is important, but how about switching the mind off from within? As well as relaxing music (obviously whatever suits the individual), you can use breathing techniques to relax the body before sleep. Start at the toes, tense your body for about 10 seconds, take a deep breath, exhale and slowly relax, working your way up from your feet to your legs, to your trunk, to your left arm, to your right arm, and your head, focusing on relaxing and releasing those areas of tension
from your body. There are a number of similar things you can do — some like gentle yoga or meditation — but what is common among them is really relaxing the body, bringing the heart rate down and setting the tone for sleep. This is also achieved through good, consistent sleep practices and [sleep] hygiene practices over a long period of time. It’s unrealistic to practise poor sleep habits for weeks before a competition, going to bed at all different times such as 9, 11, 12 o’clock at night, then all of a sudden you want to have one night of good sleep the night before. You should be trying to make this a habit prior to competition.
Ever feel flat or tired on comp day? Take a tip or two from the experts below…
THE ATHLETES’ TIPS How to handle it when comp day comes and you feel flat and/or tired: If you feel like this, you need to make sure you are hydrated and have eaten enough. I sometimes feel like this prior to weigh-in, but feel better afterward, when I know I can eat. That said, it could be unrelated to diet. Mentally, you just have to accept that it is how you feel and continue on — sometimes you feel bad before a match and you perform very well; sometimes it’s the opposite. – Lachlan Giles, Pan Pacific BJJ champion & physiotherapist
Nine times out of 10, feeling ‘flat’ or ‘tired’ would be purely mental, hence taking steps to prepare the mind; listening to appropriate music and certain relaxation techniques would usually address such feelings. In cases where the feeling might be genuine as a result of lack of sleep or malnutrition, I would
have to re-energise myself through food (complex carbs during the day and simple carbs closer to the event) and caffeine. A quick ‘power nap’ can also help address fatigue; notwithstanding, when it’s time for my event, I know that the adrenaline will take care of any fatigue. – Serge Mykhaylenko, AKF national karate champion
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