One of the reasons that people drop out of their exercise regiment is fatigue (physical and mental fatigue), which is often triggered by lack of sleep.The minute you feel really tired or exhausted, it’s very unlikely that you’ll find the willpower to make yourself exercise on that day. And once you start missing workouts, it becomes harder and harder to get back on track.

There are two problems here:

1. Most people don’t get enough sleep to begin with (under 6-7 hrs per night in many cases), and…
2. When you exercise, you drain your energy level, break down muscle, spike your cortisol levels and produce muscle inflammation – all of which require additional sleep in order to recharge your battery, repair the damage and enhance your lean muscle mass gains.

Many competitive athletes get 8-11 hrs of sleep per 24-hour cycle. The more demanding the sport, the more sleep is required to recover and get the training benefit in muscle gains, endurance and explosive power, etc.

So, if you are adding 40-90 minutes of exercise to your daily routine, in addition to working all day, managing a household, socializing etc., then I will tell you that it will likely exhaust you after a while, and you’ll start missing more and more workouts simply due to fatigue.

The simple truth is, if you’re going to exercise regularly, you need to also plan to sleep a little more than you do now, especially if your compliance has not been up to par thus far. To keep it simple, try adding one more hour of sleep to your usual schedule and see how more energetic you feel, and how much easier it is to be more compliant with your exercise goals.I think you’ll be quite surprised and impressed with yourself. It’s a bit ironic, but one of the best ways to improve your ability to exercise is to get more rest.

Eat Smart, Live Well, Look Great

Dr. James Meschino
DC,MS, ROHP