Gain Muscle While You Sleep?

Maybe your mom did have a reason for making you get your 8 hours every night.  Sleep is probably one of the most overlooked areas of human performance.  I'm sure all of you have experienced that feeling of being dazed and confused after a night of terrible sleep or none at all.  A lack of sleep can have a huge impact on performance. Research has shown that it may not have a significant effect on maximal performance; meaning if you were to stay up all night you could still probably perform maximal effort exercises (i.e. sprints or max lifts) just as well as you could after a full nights rest. However, sub-maximal efforts or long duration exercises may be affected by the lack of sleep. Also, metabolically there could be some major disruptions occurring that could impact you later down the road. For example, sleep is one of the most potent stimulators for the production of growth hormone (GH).  Growth hormone is a major player in protein synthesis leading to increases in muscle and bone mass.  Levels seem to reach their peak about 4 hours after the onset of sleep and slowly decline throughout the night/day.  Therefore if you go a night without sleep or "good sleep" you will miss out on this increase in GH. Another hormone that is affected by sleep is cortisol.  Cortisol is often referred to as the "stress" hormone.  It is often classified as a catabolic hormone which means it can lead to tissue (i.e. muscle) breakdown instead of synthesis, which is NOT ideal for someone looking to gain muscle mass.  Cortisol levels are highly correlated with a lack of sleep; meaning the more you don't sleep, the higher your cortisol levels will likely be which can be detrimental to muscle growth.   A lack of sleep can also increase insulin resistance which is a condition than can lead to Type II diabetes if continued over time.  This will also set you up for possible weight gain and trouble maintaining your figure.

These are just a view of the effects that sleep deprivation can have on the body as it relates to performance and building muscle.  There is a slue of other side-effects, including psychological, physical and emotional effects that are also related to sleep.  Basically, sleep is a time for your body to rest, recover, and repair itself for the next day of activities.  Without out, you are setting yourself up for failure.