What effect does sleep have in fitness?

[MaxRocks]

I'm trying to gain weight and muscle, although weight is more important (because if I have weight, I can convert it to muscle with some hard work, but it's much harder to create muscle before you put on some pounds).

The thing is, I suffer from occasional insomnia, which causes me to sleep 5 or 6 hours. I know 8 hours are optimal for muscle repair and recover, but assuming that I don't mind if muscle repair takes a little longer, do they also affect the weight I'm gaining? Will I stop gaining weight (or gain less weight) if I sleep less?

[justyournormalguy]

You probably shouldn't think of it as converting fat into muscle. You need to be supplying your body with lots of energy while you work out hard, but it should be healthy stuff. Also, sleep is important, but it not make it or break it. I am in high school and I run cross country. My team has 11 practices a week, I challenge myself academically, and I definitely don't get enough sleep. Our training is very hard, and as a result I am very fast and my body is in fantastic shape. If you train hard, you will become fit, even without adequate sleep, though sleep with definitely help.

[AdamThomas]

Yeah you will grow slower, and maybe find it harder to gain muscle/easier to gain fat. Try to sleep earlier if possible.

[MaxRocks]

Yea but fat is welcome right now Ill care more bout muscle later ^^

[AdamThomas]

You don't want to get fat. I just read your question again - you can't convert fat into muscle. While it's highly likely that you'll gain a little fat when bulking you should aim to minimise this instead focusing on building as much lean muscle as possible. Whoever told you that you could turn fat into muscle doesn't know what they're talking about.

[MaxRocks]

Lots of people did tho ;/ the thing is I'm too skinny, I should aim for more 10 kgs than those I have right now. Ideally I should gain 1kg fat, 2kg muscle every week (that's why I workout every day. The plan I'm with only recommends 1 rest day per week, but I rest the whole weekend. Besides that I lift every day).

After I get to 76kg (my goal), then I can reduce calorie intake and start worrying more about my diet (stop eating too many carbs, starting caring more about macros, etc) and muscle mass, because by then the point will be to maintain the weight and reduce the fat by increasing muscle. Scientifically this means that I will consume just enough calories to get burned and/or to convert into muscle, but there will be no calories left to turn into fat. Therefore fat burns while new calories go to the muscles.
But until then all fat is welcome, otherwise I'm too skinny to make any gains.

[AdamThomas]

Lots of people have no idea what they're talking about. It's physiologically impossible to gain more than 1lb of muscle per week, and that's with optimal nutrition, sleep, exercise etc. A more realistic goal would be 0.5lbs per week. You might think that eating more will make you gain muscle quicker but it won't, you'll just gain fat quicker and maybe gain too much fat.

[Athleticbroo]

You are doing it wrong if you trying to gain bad weight too brah, Thats not bulking.

But yea, It won't effect it much altho you have to sleep good amount for recovering muscles. When you workout, your tissues in muscles break and when you sleep they recover with double speed hence muscle growth.

[MaxRocks]

Uhm thanks for answering ^^
Like I said to Adam I'm trying to get to the point where I'm no longer skinny and then I'll start cleaning up my diet and focusing more on muscle and protein. But until then I think a better approach would be to care about getting weight than muscles.

Then again I could be wrong. That's why I'm still training every day, just in case.

[Athleticbroo]

Bro you are doing it wrong. I suggest join a misc, Helps great for guys in this and message me. Your muscles need recovery, so you gotta have at least 2off days. And yea gaining muscles would be better, even if you gain 4ppunds of exact muscles. It would make it look like you are 10 pounds heavier