It’s a common notion that afternoon and evening workouts will mess up your sleeping patterns.
A new study published on February 22 in Experimental Physiology, a publication put out by the Physiological Society, challenges this idea.
The study was done at the Charles Sturt University in Australia, where a group of men were made to work out on different days, at different times of the day, and had their sleeping patterns monitored.
These were high-intensity workouts.
They would go for a one-minute all-out cycling session followed by four minutes of rest, and they repeated this pattern six times in every workout. It turns out that evening workouts have little to no effect on how fast you fall asleep, how long you sleep, when you wake up, or even the depth of your sleep.
As for the workout itself, the study shows that having your workout in the evening can actually enhance your performance, enabling you to sprint better. This means a high-intensity workout might be more effective in the evening or afternoon.
Evening workouts also help reduce ghrelin, which is the hunger hormone produced and released in the stomach.
If you commonly find yourself going to bed or waking up in the middle of the night craving food, working out later in the day could help curb this.
This study’s results correlate with other studies that have shown the same results. Each dismantle the common myth that evening workouts affect your sleeping patterns.
So, your sleeping patterns remain unaffected by late workouts, and you can also help curve hunger at night by working out later in the day.
You might even actually perform better if you schedule your physical activity for the afternoon or evening, making the most of your workout every time.
