How to enhance your training for FREE!

Do any of these questions sound familiar? What are we gonna do in the next phase? Are we gonna go heavy? Are we gonna circuit train? Are we gonna do speed work? Are we gonna do endurance work? What exercises are we gonna do?

What if the response is…….”It doesn’t matter”… What if the focus and result of the last 30 years of human performance research was all for not?!! When you read what follows you’ll know its true.

So many are overly concerned with what to do in their training sessions. Athletes, clients, trainers, coaches spend endless hours questioning, debating, and theorizing on what’s the BEST way to train. Complex combinations of exercises, methods and periodization etc.

Why doesn’t it matter? If the body isn’t in a state to either receive the training or recover from it – the training will actually cause the reverse of its intent ie. training plateaus, injury, fatigue, and even sickness.

So how do you optimize your training? Easy….with one of the most underated, underestimated, lowest cost and effective performance enhancers yet…….its called DO NOTHING!

Not “Do nothing” in the lazy “sit on your ass” sense but in the activity of SLEEP! Now before you go and walk off scratching your head say, “where’s the magic in that?” Consider that sleep comprises one third of our lives and has direct contribution to every aspect of our being.

Consider relative to the number of hours spent training versus number of hours spent sleeping. Here is a generalization – if a trainee’s average workout duration is approx 1.5 to 2hrs long 3-4 days a week - total time spent training is 4.5 to 8hrs versus the 56 hours of recommended sleep. Sleep could be one of the greatest contributors to the training result!

What does sleep effect? Everything. It has influence on:
1. your decision making
2. your mood and emotional health (thereby affecting relationships, stress levels etc)
3. your nutrition (meal timing, food choices etc)
4. your ability to focus
5. your ability to sleep and so on.

For our more scientific community – Sleep affects
1. Release and regulation of specific hormones
a. growth hormone (an active hormone in tissue repair)
b. cortisol (a stress hormone)
2. glycogen synthesis (glycogen is the source of energy used for exercise)

Here are some guidelines to help with your sleep

1. Establish a pattern of sleep ensuring going to bed and rising at the same time
2. Get great quality of sleep
3. Control your sleep environment
4. Ensure your vitamin contains appropriate levels of chelated minerals
5. During times of higher level stress (ie. travel, work, or stages of higher level intensity or volumes of training) you can use a sleep enhancer such as melatonin
a. Melatonin is a naturally occurring hormone that regulates sleep and wake cycles. A non-drug and non-habit forming alternative.

Ian King writes extensively on this topic in his Get Buffed! book series (www.kingsports.net) . A series I recommend highly for trainees and trainers alike! Additionally if you have further questions on the supplements mentioned in this article send me an email at [email protected].

Now get some quality rest on a regular basis and find out for yourself the benefit of doing nothing (*SLEEP!)