Sleep Aids for Weight Loss Tucson AZ

Muscle Growth, Fat Loss, and Sleep

Bodybuilders focus so much of their time on nutrition and training only to neglect a factor that is at least of equal importance?sleep. But why is sleep so critical for optimum muscle gain and fat loss? Here's why?

• During sleep high quantities of growth hormone (GH) are pumped out into your blood stream. GH is vital for tissue repair, not the least, muscle tissue. When you've been training hard and breaking down muscle, so that your body will overcompensate and build even more muscle, then having high levels of GH is vital. GH also helps preferential utilization of fat for energy.

• Cortisol is a catabolic hormone that stimulates the breakdown of protein in the muscles into glucose and glycogen. Not good. High levels of cortisol are also associated with abdominal fat gain. Sleep decreases the levels of the hormone cortisol.

• Lack of sleep can lead to a decrease in insulin sensitivity. When you become more insulin resistant it means less glucose gets transported to muscle cells, which in turn means less protein synthesis sparking off less muscle growth. Poor insulin sensitivity also causes the body to more readily store energy as fat. Sleep has such profound effect on insulin that studies have shown that men of 30 years old with poor sleep habits have insulin response levels comparable to 60-year-olds.

• Studies have also shown that lack of sleep results in decreased levels of the hormone, leptin. This hormone has a hand in many metabolic processes not least in keeping you lean.

• When you fall asleep there is a decrease in your body's metabolism with signals to send higher levels of blood to your muscles, which encourages muscle growth.

• Levels of muscle building, fat burning hormone, and testosterone are also heavily influenced by sleep. There's a direct relationship between length of sleep and levels of testosterone.

• Sleep is the primary time when central nervous system (CNS) recovers from any stresses or strains. This is especially important when training heavily for muscle growth?if you fatigue your CNS you will struggle to gain any new muscle, not to mention you'll have low energy, poor mood and be more susceptible to injury and illness.

Quite simply, if you're not getting adequate quality sleep, you'll be short changing yourself in any goals to build muscle and get lean.

So How Much Sleep Do I Need?

Research suggests that 7.5 hours of sleep is "optimal," but in truth an exact optimal amount of sleep is problematic to define?many of these studies don't factor in diet, exercise, health condition, and so on. It will vary from person to person. And then you have to consider a bodybuilder is not representative of a "normal" person, their needs are different.

A good rule of thumb is sleep enough so that you have good levels of energy and mood through out the day. If you feel strong urges to sleep during the day, you aren't getting enough sleep. ...