Athletes awaken to the link between sleep and sports performance/
Research says sleeping longer makes athletes play better, and teams tracking sleep stats to find advantages.
As a kinesiology student Alex Malone has a keen awareness of the link between recovery and performance, but didn’t always think it applied to him. One day last winter the star running back at U of T headed into an intense weight training session on five hours sleep, but still figured he could dead-lift 600 pounds.
He made the lift, but as he put the barbell down blood tricked from his nose. Then it flowed. And then he admitted to himself he wasn’t sleeping enough to support his heavy lifting.
“Sometimes I’ve had enough rest days that I should be performing well, but I’m physically and mentally exhausted,” says Malone, who sleeps seven hours a day in season but less than six over the winter.
These days, athletes at U of T regularly complete sleep questionnaires to help coaches manage their workloads, and across the broader world of high-level sport sleep is getting more attention than ever.
Last week, fitful sleep forced Texas Rangers first baseman Prince Fielder to leave spring training in Arizona and head to a sleep clinic, where he was diagnosed with sleep apnea.
In Florida, the New York Yankees pushed practice time back to noon to allow players to sleep later and perform better.
It’s not just a matter of telling players to get more rest. Increasingly, teams are tracking sleep like any other stat, using the data they glean to adjust schedules and gain an edge in competition.
The Raptors are one of a growing number of pro and NCAA outfits working with Vancouver-based Fatigue Science, a small firm that provides sleep monitoring data for clients in high-level sports and heavy industry.
