Grow Muscle Faster By Getting A Proper Sleep

2 July 2009, 7:24 pm

Although it may not seem like a big deal, the truth is that you will grow muscle faster if you give your body the rest it needs each night.

Dramatic changes in your physique aren’t possible in a short amount of time unless you ensure that your body gets a proper amount of restful sleep every night.

Does your sleep really affect whether or not you can grow muscle faster?

To answer this question, let’s take a look at what happens to your body without adequate and proper sleep…

1) Your mental focus decreases.

When you experience sleep deprivation, your mental state is affected. Research has shown that if you do not adequately rest just for one night, your ability to focus your mind on completing tough tasks decreases.

Full intensity is the key to grow muscle faster, and in order to ensure that you’re putting everything you have into your workouts each time, your mind needs to be sharp.

2) You will experience a decrease in physical performance.

Sleep deprivation hurts both your mental state and physical performance. If you don’t get enough sleep, your strength will be affected, and you will end up using less weight or doing fewer reps, both of which you must do to grow muscle faster.

You will only grow muscle faster if you focus on steadily increasing the poundage you lift in all of your exercises, and this can only be done when you have the strength to do it.

3) Your muscle recovery will be cut short.

Most of us already know that our muscles are not growing IN the gym. Your muscle size increases while you are OUT of the gym, sleeping, resting, and eating.

While you sleep, your body is working hard towards the recovery and remodeling of damaged muscle tissue. Not only do your muscles require recovery time, but your central nervous system, joints and immune system need rest too.

4) Your hormone levels get compromised.

You limit the production of some of the most important muscle building and fat burning hormones that circulate inside your body if you do not get ample sleep. These include biggies like cortisol, testosterone, growth hormone, and insulin.

To put it simply, when you don’t sleep, each and every one of these important hormones is affected…

a) Cortisol: A major catabolic stress hormone, this bad boy works hard to increase abdominal fat storage and break down muscle tissue for energy.

Studies have proven that excess cortisol is produced when you don’t get enough sleep.

b) Testosterone: This is THE most important muscle building hormone. The more testosterone you have in your body, the greater its capability to build muscle.

Testosterone levels decrease when you are sleep deprived.

c) Growth Hormone: Plays a major role in regenerating the body and building and maintaining muscle.

As you sleep, your body experiences a surge in growth hormone. If you cut into your sleep, you reduce this hormonal surge.

Insulin: This is a key hormone that helps your body’s cells get important nutrients.

Your body’s insulin resistance levels are increased when you do not get enough sleep. Your body is affected because it will then release higher-than-normal amounts of insulin to compensate. Too much insulin can cause extra fat storage, diabetes, or even heart disease.

Which brings me to the question: how much sleep is sufficient to grow muscle faster?

Well, it’s not the same for everyone, and it varies from person to person. A good rule of the thumb is to try and get 8 hours of shuteye every night. But don’t feel bad if you feel the need to sleep for 9 hours or more.

Your goal is to get enough sleep to be at 100% performance levels in the day. If you find that you typically feel tired and sluggish, you really need to get more sleep.

Sleeping will help you to grow muscle faster and become stronger because it will:.

- Increase mental focus and build up energy resources.
- Increase your strength.
- Enable you to recover sufficiently between workouts.
- Ensure ample recovery in between workouts.
- Improve testosterone levels.
- Enhance levels of growth hormone.
- Reduce resistance to insulin.

Looking at all the evidence, it’s clear your focus should be on getting more sleep.

Sweet dreams!