Impact of extreme physical exercise (28 consecutive marathons) on sleep time and structure

sleep is affected by high-intensity physical exercise and is modulated by the recovery process. The results of this study highlight the importance of SWS in the recovery from physical fatigue due to the effect of extreme physical exercise, which is demonstrated by the enormous increase in SWS that accounts for almost 40 % of the Total Sleep Time, surpassing even the stage 2 percentage. It is also shown that REM sleep has no role in the recovery from physical fatigue, as it is in fact considerably decreased by the effect of extreme physical exercise. Previous studies had not reported results with these magnitudes.