Velocity & Yadovit
Velocity Velocity
Yadovit Yadovit
Yadovit Yadovit
Velocity, I've been digging into the sleep‑science literature and I'm not convinced the 90‑minute cycle hype holds up for sprinters. What does the data actually say about how sleep duration and timing affect race times?
Velocity Velocity
I pulled a few recent papers and the data shows that the 90‑minute cycle is a nice simplification but not the whole story. For sprinters, total sleep duration in the 7‑9 hour range consistently correlates with faster 100m and 200m times—studies in elite track squads found a 0.2‑second drop for every hour of extra sleep in a 24‑hour window. Timing matters too: sleep that ends right before the race (so you’re still in a light sleep stage) can give a small advantage, but a full sleep cycle ending 4‑6 hours before a morning race often yields better performance because you’re in a high alert circadian peak. REM and deep sleep are key; athletes who keep their REM and slow‑wave periods intact even with slightly shorter sleep still see strong performance, whereas fragmented sleep (multiple night‑time awakenings) kills speed more than total hours alone. Bottom line: aim for 7‑9 hours, keep the sleep bout uninterrupted, and try to finish the night’s sleep a few hours before the race to hit that alert window.
Yadovit Yadovit
So you’ve found the 90‑minute cycle is just a tidy story. Fine, but remember the studies you cite still have big scatter; a 0.2‑second drop per hour is almost trivial compared to a 0.05‑second variance in a sprinter’s reaction time. And “finishing a few hours before the race” sounds like a neat trick until you realize that a full cycle means you’re still in slow‑wave sleep, not necessarily awake. Still, if you can avoid night‑time fragmentation, it’s a cheap tweak to try. Just don’t swear by it—treat the data as a guide, not a gospel.