Sleep prior to and following competition in professional rugby league athletes

Routine, Routine, Routine: Sleep Regularity and its Association with Sleep Metrics in Professional Rugby Union Athletes

BACKGROUND

Maintaining a consistent sleep and wake time is often reported as a key component of circadian rhythmicity and quality sleep. However, the impact of sleep onset and offset time variability on overall sleep outcomes are underreported in elite athlete populations. This study investigated the relationship between sleep onset and offset time variability using the sleep regularity index (SRI) and measures of sleep and well-being in professional rugby union athletes. Twenty-three professional male rugby union athletes (mean ± SD, age: 23 ± 3 y) underwent sleep monitoring via wrist actigraphy for three weeks during a pre-season phase of training and completed a daily wellness questionnaire. Median SRI was calculated and used to stratify the trainees into two quantile groups: >76.4 SRI (Regular, n = 11) and < 76.4 SRI (Irregular, n = 12).

RESULTS

The regular sleep group showed significantly longer total sleep duration (p = 0.02, d = 0.97) compared to the irregular group (7:42 ± 0:29 vs. 7:18 ± 0:20 h: min per night, respectively). Furthermore, while not statistically significant, the regular sleep group showed greater sleep efficiency and less wake episodes compared to irregular sleepers, as demonstrated by moderate effect sizes (d = 0.71 and 0.69, respectively).

CONCLUSIONS

The results from this study indicate that minimizing variability in sleep onset and offset time is beneficial for increasing sleep duration and may improve sleep efficiency during pre-season training in elite male rugby union athletes. This study provides evidence for the importance of including sleep-wake routines as a key component of sleep education interventions.

Get sleep or get stumped: sleep behaviour in elite South African cricket players during competition

Despite evidence supporting the positive affect sleep has on sport performance, there is limited application of sleep research in cricket. This study investigated the sleep behaviours of 26 elite South African cricket players (28.6 ± 4.0 years) during home and away competition. Players completed an altered version of the Core Consensus Sleep Diary every morning post-travel, pre-match and post-match. Linear mixed model regression was used to compare differences in sleep between time-periods, venues and formats. Spearman's correlations (r_s) assessed the relationship of match performance and sleep. Post-match total sleep time (06:31 ± 01:09) was significantly (p < 0.05) shorter compared to post-travel (07:53 ± 01:07; g = 1.19) and pre-match (08:43 ± 01:03; g = 1.98). Post-travel sleep onset latency and sleep efficiency were significantly shorter (-20; g = 1.35) and higher (+10.4%; g = 0.74) at home than away respectively. Longer sleep onset latencies and shorter total sleep times were significantly associated with poorer One-Day International (r_s = -0.57) and Test (r_s = 0.59) batting performances respectively. The poor post-match sleep behaviour, and the sleep and performance correlations, provide motive for future interventions to focus on recovery and the use of sleep monitoring as a competitive advantage.