Olivia Møller
Freediver - Activist - Explorer
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Olivia Møller
Freediver - Activist - Explorer
In a world that romanticizes the grind, glorifies hustle culture, and praises those who sleep less as somehow more committed, there's an unspoken truth few want to face: consistently getting less than seven hours of quality sleep is not a badge of honor. It's a fast track to cognitive decline, emotional instability, and, for athletes, suboptimal performance. If you're an athlete or someone who treats your body like a high-performance machine, sleep is not optional. It's fuel. It's recovery. It's where the gains actually happen.
To understand the importance of sleep, especially for athletes, we need to look beyond yawns and eye bags. Sleep is a complex biological process divided into distinct stages: light sleep, deep sleep, and rapid eye movement (REM) sleep. Each stage performs vital functions. Deep sleep is when the body repairs tissues, releases growth hormone, and builds bone and muscle. REM sleep, on the other hand, is the brain's playground, where memories consolidate, learning is enhanced, and mood is regulated. Cutting your sleep short cuts these processes off at the knees.
Consider this: a study conducted by Stanford University on their basketball team revealed that players who extended their sleep to 10 hours a night improved their sprint times, shooting accuracy, and overall mood. Similar findings have been observed in swimmers, tennis players, and football athletes. When you’re sleeping more, you’re not just resting — you’re training. And the reverse is true: when you’re sleep-deprived, you’re actively hindering your performance. According to the Sleep Foundation, a single night of inadequate sleep can reduce reaction time by up to 300 milliseconds. For comparison, the average human blink takes about 100 milliseconds. That means being sleep-deprived is like playing your sport with a half-second delay — a massive disadvantage at the elite level.
And this isn’t just about milliseconds. Sleep deprivation is linked to an increased risk of injury. One study on adolescent athletes found that those who slept fewer than eight hours per night were 1.7 times more likely to suffer an injury than their peers who got more rest. The underlying causes are multifaceted: slower reaction times, reduced coordination, and impaired judgment. When your brain and body aren’t communicating efficiently, mistakes happen — and mistakes in sports often mean injuries.
But the damage doesn’t stop at torn ligaments and lost races. Sleep affects the endocrine system, too. During deep sleep, the body releases testosterone and growth hormone — two key ingredients in muscle recovery and growth. A lack of sleep suppresses these hormones, which can translate to weaker gains from your workouts and longer recovery times. For male athletes, in particular, chronic sleep restriction has been shown to significantly reduce testosterone levels, sometimes by as much as 10-15% — the equivalent of aging a decade overnight.
Then there’s cortisol, the body’s primary stress hormone. Sleep deprivation cranks up cortisol production, which not only makes you feel more anxious and irritable but also increases muscle breakdown. In other words, if you’re not sleeping well, your body is essentially eating away at your hard-earned gains. And while we’re here, let’s talk about appetite: lack of sleep skews your hunger hormones, increasing ghrelin (the hunger hormone) and decreasing leptin (the satiety hormone). The result? You’re more likely to overeat, especially high-sugar, high-fat foods — hardly ideal for maintaining a competitive physique.
Now, think about the mental side of the game. Sports are not just physical contests — they’re cognitive battlegrounds. Split-second decisions, tactical awareness, and emotional control can determine outcomes. Sleep is foundational to all of this. A well-rested brain processes information more efficiently, retains strategies better, and remains calmer under pressure. Sleep deprivation, meanwhile, is associated with poorer decision-making, slower problem-solving, and increased emotional reactivity. No wonder elite sports teams — from the NBA to Olympic squads — now employ sleep coaches and monitor athletes’ rest just as rigorously as they monitor their training loads.
In the 2024 lead-up to the Paris Olympics, the Indian Olympic team worked closely with a sleep specialist to help athletes cope with anxiety and optimize their recovery. Individual athletes like Gabby Thomas have openly spoken about how sleep became a non-negotiable part of their training routine, ranking right up there with nutrition and strength conditioning. These are not anecdotes — these are performance strategies grounded in data.
And yet, the general culture surrounding sleep remains conflicted. In the business world, sleep is often seen as the enemy of productivity. In sports, rest days and long sleep durations can be misconstrued as signs of laziness. This mindset is deeply flawed. Rest is not the absence of effort; it's part of the effort. Recovery is not passive. It’s when the body and mind synthesize all the hard work and build you into something stronger.
So what happens to athletes — and regular folks — who habitually skimp on sleep? In the short term, you’ll feel groggy, moody, and unfocused. In the long term, the consequences are more severe: increased risk of cardiovascular disease, obesity, type 2 diabetes, and depression. Your immune system becomes compromised, making you more susceptible to illness. And your lifespan? It may shorten. According to a 2017 study published in the journal "Sleep Health," chronic sleep deprivation is associated with an increased risk of all-cause mortality.
For athletes who travel frequently, crossing time zones adds another layer of complexity. Jet lag can throw off circadian rhythms, delay recovery, and impair performance. Smart teams are now employing chronobiologists to help mitigate these effects — shifting sleep schedules before travel, using light exposure and melatonin strategically, and tracking rest via wearables. Even something as simple as a consistent pre-sleep routine — dimming lights, turning off screens, avoiding caffeine in the afternoon — can significantly improve sleep quality.
None of this is particularly revolutionary, and yet so many people, athletes included, still treat sleep as optional. They double down on supplements, invest in cutting-edge gear, and obsess over training minutiae, all while ignoring the low-hanging fruit of performance: sleep. It’s not sexy. It won’t show up in your highlight reel. But it's the foundation upon which every other aspect of your health and performance is built.
If you’re looking to get better at your sport — or just feel better in general — don’t start with some new supplement or training hack. Start with sleep. Go to bed a bit earlier. Make your bedroom a sanctuary. Treat it like a pre-game ritual. Because that’s exactly what it is. When you understand that sleep is not a luxury but a tool — a performance enhancer hiding in plain sight — you unlock a level of recovery and output that simply isn’t accessible any other way.
The science is clear. The real-world examples are piling up. And the next frontier of elite performance? It’s not just about training harder. It’s about sleeping smarter.