You snooze, you don't lose - How to sleep like Cristiano Ronaldo
Cristiano Ronaldo is the biggest draw in global football, at 36 years old.
When most footballers would have retired, Ronaldo is still at peak performance.
Last season, he was the leading goalscorer in the Italian League, Seria A, with 29 goals for Juventus.
That brought his total to 81 goals scored in 98 games for Juve.
Quite incredible!
With CR7, it’s all about power in the numbers.
His signing by Manchester United means that he’ll be earning £480,000 a week.
(Nice work, if you can get it).
And his transfer announcement has broken all social media records…
To achieve the super-human fitness to create these numbers, apparently every day, Ronaldo eats double the calories of an average American man (probably better quality calories though, you’d think).
And he completes rigorous scientifically-designed exercise routines.
But he also gets expert help with his much needed shut-eye.
Cristiano Ronaldo Sleeping Secrets
Since his first stint at Manchester United, Cristiano has been advised by Sleep expert, Nick Littlehales on the benefits of quality sleep.
Littlehales is touted as the world’s leading sports sleep coach.
He has worked with numerous elite sport teams from British Cycling, Olympic teams, the NBA, the NHL, and England Rugby.
He developed the R90 technique which is made up of 7 Key Sleep Recovery Indicators.
This method leans much more into the power of napping throughout the day, as opposed to the traditional quest for that elusive 8 hours of undisturbed sleep.
All of the R90 approach is detailed in Nick’s book, Sleep.
The amazing benefits of Napping
Nick Littlehales is not the first to extol the virtues of power naps - Salvador Dali proclaimed naps as the key to his creativity!
And researchers from Harvard University found that midday napping (siestas) reduced coronary mortality by 37%.
The Harvard study found that people who regularly napped for 30 minutes, at least three times per week, had reduced their chance of dying by heart disease by over 1/3.
CR7 naps up to 5 times a day
On Littlehales’ advice, Ronaldo takes a '90-minute nap’ up to 5 times a day to aid repair and muscle growth to his superman-like physique.
According to Littlehales, a cycle of smaller bursts of power sleeping is how humans slept before we became dependent on artificial lighting via the invention of the lightbulb.
In fact, Littlehales is actually vehemently opposed to the idea of the elusive 8-hour sleep.
With such elite clients like Ronaldo clearly benefitting from the R90 napping/sleeping method, it’s hard to argue against it, even if it might seem counter-intuitive to our established thoughts on the ideal circadian rhythm.
However, Ronaldo is not a normal human being, and doesn’t lead a normal lifestyle like us mere mortals.
The Sleep Course
For people with more normal lifestyles, if more and better sleep is your goal, but you don’t have the money to hire the world’s top sports sleep coach, then we have the next best thing for you.
And it’s free!
Yes, The Sleep Course is our free gift to you… because we want to help you wake up winning.
In this short course, you’ll learn:
An overview of the science of sleep
How to sleep better
The best sleeping positions
If you are a morning or night person
What to do when you can't sleep
We hope you’ll enjoy the course and please let us know if it helped make your life a little bit better.
Sleep well.
