IN THE latest fitness column from BlitzFitMe, Dan Reeve writes about sleep and why it is essential for weight loss and more importantly long term health.
Would you believe me if I told you that you can lose weight by simply spending more time in slumber land? No, well after attending the Bioprint course run by the world's best strength coach, Charles Poliqiun, I can confirm it is possible.
The BioPrint course looks at our individual hormonal balances and how and where we store our body fat is affected by these hormones.
Scientists have identified sleep as one of the cornerstones of health, mental and physical, and it turns out that sleep can not only keep you healthy but also help you get thinner.
The growing waistlines of the nation are thought to be related to the growing insomnia epidemic and obesity curves in western world countries match that of sleep deprivation curves.
So how do our hormones react to a lack of shuteye? Here comes the science........ One of the main effects of sleep deprivation is that it drives inflammation up in the body. Inflammation is known as the silent killer because it aggravates many other conditions and diseases.
As inflammation increases from the body not being given enough time to recover and regenerate, it in turn reduces the body's sensitivity to insulin and drives up cortisol production. Insulin is the nutrient storing hormone which opposes cortisol, the stress hormone. They are in delicate balance between each other to keep blood sugar level.
Crave sugary food after a restless night? Reach for the sugary cereals? That's because lack of sleep alters the balance between insulin and cortisol and destabilises your blood sugar. Not only can lack of sleep make you crave sugar but it can also make you greedy too. By shortening the duration of night you also diminish the production of leptin and boost the production of gremlin, two hormones that regulate your appetite.
Still thinking that sleep isn't important to staying healthy? Well the endocrine chaos doesn't stop there. During the night the body produces testosterone and growth hormone which are key to regeneration after a workout and necessary to maintain lean body mass. Less sleep, less testosterone, less growth hormone, more body fat.
The duration of your sleep is predictive of the magnitude of your fat loss when on a diet and exercise program. When given caloric restriction, people in a sleep-deprived group lost less fat than people in a normal sleep group.
I hope you can see now how important sleep is to your health and if being a lean mean fighting machine is your goal, adequate zzzzzzs could be your answer.
Look out for our Bioprint program in 2015. This cutting edge approach will see great results.
Stay healthy.
Dan Reeve
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