Playing Catch Up Part 1: The Zzsss

Posted by lando on Nov 13, 2013 in Workout Of The Day | 0 comments

This could kind of sort of fall in line with my ongoing holiday season series but we won’t officially put it there. Mostly because this is sound advice for all seasons not just the season of decadence and peppermint mochas.

Ever had a cookie in hand, or on the way to the pizza place, the wings place, waiting for chinese to show up at the door, and said “I’ll have to do a double tomorrow to work this off”? Or gone against your 1 late night per weekend rule and stayed up til the bars close or from watching ANOTHER on demand movie all three nights and said “definitely going to bed early Monday through Wednesday”?  The catch up game. I certainly do it. We all do it. Justifying our actions by what we will do in the near future to make up for it. Or we even try to get ahead by doubling down before the s**tshow.

Unfortunately none of these tactics work. We end up bloated and sluggish even after the double session and we feel those long late weekends well into Thursday even if we get to bed early as planned the days before.

The reason for this is that our body doesn’t play catch up. There is no such thing as making up sleep, and there certainly isn’t such a thing as canceling out bad eating with hard workouts. Sleep is a cyclical process with multiple stages controlled by the circadian rhythm. This is our internal body clock. It can be spot on if treated right and can get whacked out very easily. We all know about REM sleep, but probably one of the biggest health misconceptions is that this is the most important part of sleep. REM sleep is the lightest and shortest phase and actually the least restful. The most important part of sleep, the part where the body repairs and regenerates tissues, builds bone and muscle, and is thought to strengthen the immune system, is during stages 3 and 4. Also called slow wave or delta sleep, these stages are where we get fueled back up and ready for action.

You don’t have to be a doctor to understand that you have to get through a few stages before getting to this delta sleep stage. Like literally everything with our body, falling asleep and sleep as a whole is driven by this circadian rhythm. This schedule doesn’t like to be interrupted. If it is then your body won’t wave through the stages easily and most likely won’t get to the delta stages at all. Those restless nights where you toss and turn, waking up every hour? These nights you NEVER hit these later stages therefore NEVER getting to a resting, regenerating, recovering state. Multiple studies have shown examples of people going WEEKS without ever hitting delta stage sleep. Yikes.

The almost sickening thing is just one bad night can mess up the circadian rhythm, especially the older we get. On a good note only a few good nights in a row can get us back on track on delta sleep airlines. Personally I know when it is 9pm every night without looking at a clock because I have to fight off the nods for about 10 minutes and really never shake it. The years of a CrossFit coaching schedule has made it so 9pm is a very common bedtime for me. If I have multiple late nights on a weekend then Sunday and Monday night are impossible to stay asleep. No wonder why Tuesday and Wednesday are very tired, sore days for me. But if I keep at it trying to get back on schedule, I am all set and killing it in bed by Thursday. I mean sleep people…

Trying to play catchup is a practice in futility. There is no measure for how much sleep is needed for what, or how much makes up for lack of sleep, but the truth is that messing with your body clock makes it so you almost assuredly won’t hit those deep sleep stages even if you give yourself what is relatively tons of time in bed. You might fall asleep easily because you are a relatively relaxed person, but you will either be tossing and turning all night, going in and out of Stage 2 and being fully awake, or you will spend very little time in Stage 3 and barely if any in Stage 4. You might get 10 hours of sleep in terms of your eyes being closed and not awake, but in terms of the restful regenerating sleep that we need (especially us high intensity worker outers) those 10 hours are more like 2-3. Compare this to a consistent routine of 7 hours of sleep will yield 4-5 hours of delta stage sleep based on your sleep pattern. On top of all of this if you spend a lot of time tossing and turning you most likely are in a lot of Stage 2 sleep. Stage 2 is characterized by waves between high muscle tension and muscle relaxation. So if you toss and turn in Stage 2 all night you are almost “sleeping” in an interval workout. A really low intensity interval workout, but certainly not restful!

There is no concrete evidence on exactly how these schedules work. Everyone is different and many, many factors come into play. Paleo anyone? Yet what is known is that consistency with bedtime, a clean diet mixed with high intensity exercise, and no more than 1 night a week of off-schedule sleep makes for the best chance at getting good, quality sleep. I hope I don’t need to go into the whole alcohol and sleep thing…we all know that right?

Bottom line is there is no such thing as making up for our mistakes. I am certainly not great at this but I try my best, and when I am on point for a good series of days I definitely notice the difference in the way my body feels. Contrarily when I have a bad weekend I feel it literally all week (currently sore while sitting down writing the blog on a Wednesday…). I know that life gets in the way of sleep. In fact sleep is usually the first thing to go. I definitely am bad with this. If I get bogged down with work and life I tend to try to get it all done every night. Midnight comes and 4am is where my alarm sits and #whammy. Not good. I will preach however that I was the worst sleeper ever back in the day. I’m talking miserable and coffee addicted in high school, college, and up til about 27. Once I started eating Paleo this all changed. No lies.

Similarly to eating, however, planning ahead with sleep can be a great tool to get on a good schedule. If you are married or live with others in general, communicate with them that you plan on getting to bed at a certain time. If they aren’t on board with this then buy them a new bed, put it outside, and change the locks. Like your nutrition, sleep helps so much more than just feeling good and crushing workouts. It is integral for our long term wellness. You will die earlier than you or anyone wants if you consistently abuse your body with poor sleep habits.

And for you ” I can operate on like 4 hours of sleep” people, that 4 hours is 1-2 hours of quality sleep, and lets be honest we aren’t all in Men In Black here. Grow up. While like I said there isn’t concrete evidence of “you need X hours for X activity” it is proven that at least 3-4 hours of delta sleep is needed for fucntioning, 4-6 for high functioning. That translates into 6 hours minimum, 7-8 for high functioning. Are you cool with just fucntioning? Or are you trying to actually do something with your life? Time to grow up, quit making excuses, and get s**t done.

If you can’t plan ahead to get on a quality sleep schedule because of other people in your life then just simply ask them what they would rather have: their desired sleep schedule (or lack thereof) in exchange for your pre-mature death, or a compromise on bedtime.

THURSDAY

Strength: Push Press
5×3

WOD: 10m AMRAP
50 Pull-Ups
40 Burpees
30 Toes to Bar
20 OHS 135/95
10 Wall Climbs

Competitively Minded: 155/105

Important for Today: Pullups

How to work on kip progressions, both regular and butterfly (article with videos)