Sleep Less, Keep More Fat, Lose More Muscle
I stumbled upon a study done in 2010 in the University of Chicago. 10 overweight individuals (7 men and 3 women) were fed a 10-percent below maintenance level calorie-restricted diet for 14 days. They slept either 5.5 hours or 8.5 hours on average.
What happened was after these 14 days those who slept only 5.5 hours suffered a decrease in fat loss of 55 percent and also an increase of lean muscle mass loss of 60 percent. This leads to a lowered metabolism speed by lowering the Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR).
This proves that if you are on a calorie-restricted diet (dieting, like when trying to lose fat or lean down for a contest), sleep deprivation is your enemy – you start holding onto your fat AND in the same time giving up your muscle.
The take-away message is: If you want to avoid getting stuck in your fat loss efforts you must (among other things) avoid sleep deprivation. 5.5 hours sleep a day is all you need to put you in this unfavorable state! Keep losing fat AND keep your muscle too by making sure you sleep at least 8-8.5 hours a day. That’s all you need… as far as sleep goes.
But what happens if you over sleep? For instance on saturday, one of my day off, im so exhausted from the week that i had, that if i dont set my alarm for 8 hours i will sleep for 12 hours, resulting in less meals for the day. Is there a negative effect on over sleeping?
Thanks.
As far as I know both under- and oversleeping are not good. The optimal sleep time is 7-8 hours but more than 8h is not beneficial to you. Keep in mind that there is a (very) small number of individuals who require a lot less sleep to function as well as those who need 7-8h. Those individuals usually require 4-5 hours and they do much better than when they sleep 7-8h. Most likely, you and I are not in this group, but if you are you’d know it already.
Thanks Ivan i will have this in mind..