A Review and Thoughts about "...Tennis Players" (Reyner et al.) by a Lacrosse Player

As an athlete myself currently (Baylor lacrosse), as well as having competed in fairly competitive sports all my life, I understand the anxiety mentioned in Reyner's article.  Playing sports "takes a lot out of you."  The travel and jet-lag also mentioned are detrimental to any athlete competing nationally or abroad because competition is all about performance, and when your body is taxed from enduring a 10-hour time difference, you cannot perform at your absolute best -- something especially important I believe for team sports, since others are counting so much on your contributions.

To combat fatigue, Reyner mentions the increased use of caffeine among athletes, I suppose especially student- athletes, since students (generally I am referring to college-age students) are a large population of caffeine- consumers as it is [this phenomenon noted in Dr. Drake's article, "Caffeine Effects..."  I was intrigued by the lack of aid that caffeine provides, according to the article, aside from its help to combat "sleepiness." ...I would think that caffeine's effects on the body (i.e. increased heart rate) only multiply and athlete's speed, timing, and alertness in any given setting (here tennis).  And in fact caffeine, because it speeds up heart rate, could, in fact does sometimes increase speed -- but its help in a sport like tennis that requires judgment and accuracy is unknown because such phenomena are a function of both duration of sleep and sleep quality: so a sleep deprived tennis player may benefit from caffeine intake in that he or she is more alert during the game but the physical coordination on his/ her serve may still suffer because of poor sleep duration/ quality.  Since the direct correlation of caffeine to athletic performance is still unclear and unknown, I, other American athletes, and athletes around the world would benefit from further research into this correlation.

For this article, sixteen semiprofessional (university) tennis players with good sleep patterns (6.5-8 hours/ night) were studied across two setups: one which considered sleep deprivation alone and another which compared caffeine with placebo on performance (double blind experiment).  Sleep deprivation effects on performance varied only slightly between men and women.  Caffeine seemed to provide little aid then for men and women alike; and in general, sleep reduced by roughly one third in both studies had detrimental performance effects.  Whether a suffering athletic performance is routed in psychological doubting because of one’s awareness of sleep loss or if it is truly related to physical limits placed on the body by sleep deprivation remains to be seen.

Speaking for myself, I notice an unquantifiable but evident “slowness” in lacrosse games for which I lack sleep/ rest.  I feel that my reaction time is slower, I run slower, and think less “smart” (i.e. making the best split second decisions in the middle of a game).  Interestingly, I seem to perform my best when I get about 6-7 hours of sleep and not as well when I get more than that – something counterintuitive in my opinion.  Nonetheless, I, along with other much more gifted athletes than myself, continue to search for the habits that constitute peak athletic performance and contribute to an athlete’s best game of the season.  The information in this article is indeed a good starting place for that search but more guidance is desired.