Interventions to Improve Sleep and Performance in Athletes
Creators: name: Romyn, Georgia
Publisher: name: CQUniversity
Year: 2025
Subjects: classificationCode: 529999
subject: Other psychology not elsewhere classified

description: Sleep is widely regarded as important to performance and recovery in athletes. However, challenges like training schedules, competition, and travel may negatively affect sleep in athletes. Currently, there is a scarcity of literature examining the impact of sleep on physical and cognitive performance in athletes and means of improving sleep such as napping and timed bright light exposure (to alter the timing of the circadian system) in athletes. To address this gap, the present thesis provides novel insight into: (1) the impact of consecutive nights of sleep restriction on physical, cognitive, and self-rated performance in athletes, (2) the efficacy of daytime napping to supplement night-time sleep in athletes, (3) physical and cognitive performance of athletes immediately after a 1-h or 2-h afternoon nap, and (4) the impact of a bright light exposure and avoidance intervention on circadian adaptation, sleep and jet lag in athletes after transmeridian travel. Athletes experiencing acute moderate sleep restriction may report higher levels of sleepiness and fatigue and feel less recovered. However, provided training or competition occurs in the evening, physical and cognitive performance will likely not be impaired (Chapter 2). Sleep restriction may reduce the quality or effectiveness of training, which is a key component of athletes’ preparation for competition. In situations when training and competition schedules prohibit athletes from spending adequate time in bed at night, an effective intervention to increase total sleep duration is napping during the day (Chapter 3). Even if athletes must perform shortly after waking, performance is not impaired (provided an adequate warm up is performed). However, athletes may feel less ready to perform immediately after a nap (Chapter 4). Finally, transmeridian travel can also affect sleep in athletes, and while laboratory-based studies indicate a bright light exposure/avoidance intervention can be successfully employed to facilitate body clock adaptation following transmeridian travel, it was not effective in the field in the present thesis (Chapter 5). Nevertheless, the results of this thesis provide valuable evidence to indicate that athletes may need up to 6 days to adapt after an 8-h westward time zone change and more than 7 days to adapt after an 8-h eastward time zone change. In combination, the finding of the present thesis demonstrates that objective performance, including sprint ability, repeated sprint ability, change of direction ability, and sustained attention are unaffected by three consecutive nights of moderate sleep restriction. This is promising, suggesting that in situations when athletes are acutely sleep restricted during training and competition, or due to transmeridian travel and jet lag, objective performance is maintained. Additionally, when athletes are given sufficient time in bed, in one episode overnight or in a split-sleep schedule, they are able to obtain the recommended 8 h of sleep per day. Likewise, an ideal sleep environment may help athletes achieve daily sleep recommendations and improve sleep quality and quantity. With regard to performance, subjective capacity may be more susceptible to sleep inertia after waking from daytime naps, and moderate sleep restriction, than objective physical and cognitive performance. Together, these findings establish a foundation for subsequent research examining how sleep and performance in athletes is affected by moderate sleep restriction, daytime napping, jet lag, and interventions to reduce jet lag.