Drug Free Bodybuilding: The Importance Of A Proper Sleep
By Sean Nalewanyj
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Sean Nalewanyj is a natural bodybuilding expert and best-selling fitness author committed to providing effective, research-based advice for building muscle, burning fat and gaining strength. Sean is the creator of the "No Fail System" bodybuilding program and president of EliteImpact Labs.
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It might seem unrelated, but you really must get adequate sleep to gain muscle.
You must understand that in order to get the most gains in size and strength quickly, you must get sufficient sleep nightly.
How is sleep related to your drug free bodybuilding success?
To answer this, let's examine what occurs to your body when you are deprived of sleep...
1) Lack of mental focus.
You have less than optimal mental focus when you are sleep deprived. Research has demonstrated that just one night of missing sleep is enough to diminish your capacity and desire to concentrate on difficult assignments.
To attain drug free bodybuilding success, you must work out with total effort every time you go to the gym, and you cannot accomplish this without mental focus.
2) Diminished physical performance.
In addition to your mental focus, sleep deprivation also hinders your physical performance. When you lose sleep, you don't have all your strength, which means that you will have to use lighter weights and/or fewer reps, either of which hinders your ability to achieve drug free bodybuilding success.
Ultimately, you will only add muscle mass when you can consistently increase how much weight you lift and by making sure that you have optimal strength during your workouts to attain drug free bodybuilding success.
3) Diminished muscle recovery.
As everyone knows, the processes of muscle growth don't occur during your workouts. Your muscles grow as you sleep, rest, and eat AWAY from the gym.
Your muscles heal and damaged muscle fibers are repaired while you sleep. In addition to your muscles, you also need sufficient sleep for adequate functioning of your joints, immune system, and central nervous system.
4) Altered hormone production.
When you are deprived of sleep, production of numerous hormones, both those that help you in your drug free bodybuilding goals and those that hinder your progress, is altered. Some of the hormones that are affected include testosterone, growth hormone, insulin, and cortisol.
In other words, when you are sleep deprived, synthesis of all of these crucial hormones is altered...
a) Cortisol: A major catabolic stress hormone, it functions to elevate fat storage, particularly in the abdomen, and promote muscle catabolism for energy.
Research indicates that sleep deprivation promotes cortisol secretion.
b) Testosterone: This is the body's MOST powerful anabolic hormone. Your ability to build muscle is tied to your testosterone production.
When you are sleep deprived, synthesis of testosterone is depressed.
c) Growth Hormone: When you want to attain drug free bodybuilding success, this hormone is required to rebuild your body.
When you sleep, growth hormone production is at its apex. When you are sleep deprived, this natural spike in growth hormone synthesis is affected.
Insulin: This hormone allows your cells to attain vital nutrients.
When you don't sleep enough, your body increases its resistance to insulin. This means that your body must produce more insulin to get the same effect. As a result, you end up storing additional fat and elevating your risk of diabetes and heart disease.
Therefore, how much sleep is required to attain drug free bodybuilding success?
It goes without saying that it's not the same for any two people. As a rule, you should try to get a minimum of 8 hours of sleep a night. That doesn't mean you should stop here if you need more, so sleep for 9 hours or more if your body needs it.
You must get adequate sleep so that you are completely recovered and ready for another day. Be sure to go to bed early if you find that you feel lethargic throughout the day.
You can attain drug free bodybuilding success and gain strength because adequate sleep will allow you to:
- Gain mental focus and energy
- Improve strength
- Enhance your ability to recover following exercise
- Decrease cortisol production
- Increase testosterone production
- Elevate growth hormone secretion
- Reduce insulin resistance
All of these should help to get you in bed earlier so that you will attain drug free bodybuilding success.
Don't let the bed bugs bite!
To get your complete, fully structured muscle building program that will help you build a ripped, muscular new body in as little as 12 weeks, click below to watch this free video presentation...
