Episode #110 

Expert: Brager, Allison

“Influence of Sleep on Athlete Performance”

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Stef

Today we are joined by US Army neuroscientists and former Trek and field athlete from Brown University, Dr. Allison Brager. Allison graduated with a Bachelor's of Science in Psychology from Brown University and earned her PhD in physiology at Kent State University With her experience in sleep and circadian rhythms.

She sits on several leadership teams and service positions for the federal government, professional research societies and university departments. Additionally, Allison sits on the NCAA Mental Health Advisory Board and she co-authored the first edition of the NCAA Student Athlete Mental Health Handbook.

Dr. Brager is an amazing part of the voice and sport community as a vis expert, where she provides women athletes and teams at voice and sport with research and guidance behind the impact of sleep on the body and the mind as it relates to athletic performance today. Allison shares how she found her passion for sleep science through her own experiences as an athlete. 

Allison

So I fell in love with sleep because I was pretty much a two sport athlete my whole life. 

Just early on I knew I needed at least eight or nine hours of sleep in order to. Not just perform my best every day in practice and to compete well, but to be a good student too.

Stef

She also dives deep into the science behind the different stages of sleep,

Allison

So if you're a young athlete learning a new skill like pole vaulting or say a new complex movement in gymnastics, if you're not getting good quality REM sleep, then you're gonna have a hard time learning that skill and eventually perfecting that skill. And this is true across every element of life.

Stef

and she reminds us that preparing to perform well in sport and beyond really does start with healthy sleep routines.

Allison

It really is that discipline, like that same discipline you have in sport with doing an intentional warmup, you have to do like an intentional wind down routine. You have to find a way to trick yourself to minimize those distractions and just get after it.

Stef

 Before we get started, if you love this podcast, please leave us a rating and review on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. 

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 Welcome to the Voice and Sport Podcast. Allison, it's such a pleasure to have you on the podcast today, and we're so excited to hear about your own sleep habits and your own emotional and mental health and what really got you interested and involved in this area of study.

So we'd love to start with just how you fell in love with sleep.

Allison

 So I fell in love with sleep because I was pretty much a two sport athlete my whole life. And I had the hopes and dreams of being an Olympic athlete or a professional athlete someday. Never became an Olympic athlete, but I did become a pro athlete in my late thirties through the Army.

but you know, Just early on I knew I needed at least eight or nine hours of sleep in order to not just perform my best every day in practice and to compete well, but to be a good student too. I didn't grow up in the greatest city and the greatest environment. And so I always knew that being good at school was just as important as being good at sports.

And, you know, that really was my ticket out of town in terms of  the life I grew up in before college.

Stef 

And you attended Brown University where you competed first as a pole vault and later as a heptathlete. So can you share with us what it was like transitioning from high school to college athletics, and did you struggle with this transition and how it impacted your mental health?

Allison

Yeah. So, I came to pole vault late in the game, I guess you could say.  So I was one of the first female pole vaulters in the state of Ohio. My junior year of high school, my high school coach knew that girls were going to finally be allowed to pull vault in Ohio.  So she basically told myself and the other gymnasts on the track team that we were gonna do pole vault.

We ended up doing really well and both Darla and I went on to compete division one. She stayed local at Youngstown State and I went to Brown. So I always felt like college  was my first time to truly be a pole vaulter.  My high school, we didn't have a pole vault pit. We didn't invest in any of that.

So I used to have to travel to the only local high school in the area, which was like 20 minutes away to pole vault, like twice a week. So I was super excited about that. Did really well, made the all Ivy League my first year. And then my senior year we had a huge shortage in hip athletes and we were also just trying to game the system to do as well as possible in the Ivy League Championship that year.

So pretty much my last year, I was asked to be a hip athlete. And it was great.  I knew after that like pretty much my track career was going to be over. I used to think I had hopes and dreams of being an Olympic athlete, but obviously it became a reality my junior, senior year that although I competed well division one,  I just wasn't at that next level.

Stef

Now, you obviously know a lot about sleep, and mental health and the importance of it. But going into your first couple years  we don't always have that mindset as  young athletes.

So looking back now, what lessons did you take from being an athlete? Prioritizing your mental health, but you went on to actually study a lot of the space and like what you're doing now to help athletes. So when you reflect back on that experience, what advice would you have to young girls  that are in it now? 

Allison

I'll quote my track coach Ann Rothenberg.  She's a huge mentor and source of inspiration in my life. I actually dedicated the book I wrote, meathead  unraveling the Athletic Brain to her. But she always used to tell us either in practice or in meets like  which basically meant you had no excuses for how you performed.

Stop dwelling on the fact you missed that bar. Cuz if you think about it, with high jump and pole vault, Your meet ends because you miss you never succeed in those events, you end on a miss. I love that mindset she created because you can only control what you can control and you can't dwell on your performance.

You can only move forward and take those lessons whether good ones or bad ones, and move forward with it.  Personally, and then relying on your teammates and relying on your coaches in trusting that they're providing you with emotional support. Also like physical comfort and support too 

Stef

Your background and journey is so interesting because you eventually went on and came all the way back to the ncaa  today, where you're actually on the mental health advisory board. So can you share a little bit about this initiative and as a group, what is this advisory board meant to do?

Allison

Yeah, I feel super grateful and honored that the sleep Research Society, which is the main Professional Society for Sleep Research, asked me to serve as a board member on this. So this came to fruition in 2015 under Tragic Consequences. Basically in 2013, there was such a large number of suicides across the ncaa that the organization could no longer ignore mental health, like it had been talked about. 

But there had never been a best practices handbook. There haven't been resources from psychologists to other folks leveraged. So this is  a huge turning point in the ncaa. And so what they did is they realized that when it comes to mental health, it's a holistic picture, right?

It's not just access to care for psychologists and  supporting behavioral health staff.  A lot of it feeds into lifestyle habits, good nutrition, good sleep, having a sense of community and self-worth.  They basically ask the experts in these fields of sleep and nutrition in particular, to join forces with the NCAA and write some best practices in terms of strategies athletes can do to fall.

Sleep, especially leading up to the big game or the big practice.  Understanding that sleep concerns and disorders are unique for athletes compared to the general population. And  just putting all this information together in this handbook that's now freely downloadable.

We're actually writing a second edition of this handbook now because one of the things we didn't consider during that time was the LGBT community and trans athletes. And so that's actually gonna be a new addition because that is a whole nother subset of mental health concerns.

Stef

So where can you access this manual today? If anyone listening to this podcast wants to go check it out.

Allison

So it's on the NCAA's website  nc aa.org. And I believe it's under the Sports Science Institute cuz they're the ones who are responsible for this initiative. And then also collecting data. So they actually just completed  A study where they surveyed 20,000 athletes during covid, and they found that when you match college athletes with their non-athlete peers, mental health concerns are three times more common among athletes.

 And then when you factor in race and L G B T,  athletes who identify along the L G B T spectrum and or are not white have a five times greater risk. And  the group that is of greatest risk of them all are black female athletes.  When it comes to trusting your coaches, trusting yourself, and trusting your teammates  black women  really struggle with  finding the support in the communities.

So the NCAA is really taking this information to heart and being very intentional with who they hire now for  a sports psychology standpoint. 

Stef

Yeah, that's a big reason why we built the voice and sport platform, because we. Felt like there was not enough diversity or access in the providers that are there for these young women at the ncaa. 

So, you know, Just having two to three sports psychologists is not enough for 300, 400 athletes. Period.

And then if you think about the backgrounds of the people that are there serving these young women to your point  they're not diverse. And you need 

to have people that are there that are going to be able to connect with everybody. So, I'm really passionate about this.

Everybody at Viz is super passionate about trying to get more services and access to these athletes. If you are a young woman, an athlete today in the ncaa and you're very passionate about mental health and providing more resources, what action can you take to promote and get in front of this advisory board, or even just continue to help strengthen what the NCAA does for their women athletes?

Allison 

Honestly, I would just reach out. So they have  contacts on their website and I say that because  I've been a part of this since 2015 and this year they actually had student athletes come. So basically they took student athletes that are part of their sac. So the student athlete advisory Council from not just division one, but division.

Two and three too.  They wanna make these resources available to all athletes and all institutions under the NCAA and even n aia. But if you reach out,  they'll gladly  Invite you. There was this  national champion, cross country runner in division two.

I think she ran for Colorado College , she  had us all in tears. It was like so good to hear her story about  how much she identified as an athlete. And then she moved on  graduated, went on to work at the N I H in DC and she didn't realize  how much of her identity was built around being an athlete now working in  a world class science institute.

She felt like her identity had just been ripped from her. And she talked about how she spent her first six months to nine months after graduating in a state of depression because she didn't have that community that she literally built her whole life around. And I think a lot of athletes do struggle with that when they go on to their professional careers. I think  what prevented me from getting to that place is I then went on and coached for a local high school. So I've protected myself, maintaining that identity, either as an athlete or on the other side as a coach.

But I realized not everyone has that opportunity.

Stef

Yeah, I think it's so important to realize that you're more than an athlete very early on. And that's why we do sessions on the platform on this topic actually, because as important athletics is to all of us, it is more important who you are as a person, as a human. And that can be sometimes hard for any athletes that are in the thick of  high level competition.

What kind of advice do you have for any young woman out there that might be struggling with finding that identity outside of sport? What can she be doing now in high school and college to make sure she sets herself up for success?

Allison

 I think you have to motivate yourself and trust yourself. You can find other communities outside of athletics.  I did that working in undergraduate research. Internship  I exposed myself to students who had a shared love for science and doing research, but I was the only one who had a love for athletics.

And so I think  that's a challenge, but it's something you have to do because you'll realize that you're not gonna have that sense of camaraderie centered around athletics once you graduate. I'd like to think that's why I gravitated towards the army, right? Because the army is as close to being a college athlete as you could ever possibly be. 

Stef

What did that journey look like for you? You had your undergraduate in psychology and then you know, you joined the Army, but you also got your PhD in Biological Sciences. So when did you make that decision about going and joining the Army and how did that affect your academics in studying sleep?

Allison

So I actually didn't join the Army until I was 33. I did my undergrad, then I went right to my PhD  which focused on the intersection between sleep, exercise, and the brain.  And then I did a sleep medicine fellowship in Atlanta. And then I ended up doing a second sleep fellowship  with the military and it was really my first day there where the department chair was like, "Hey, I think you'd make a great Army officer."

And I had always wanted to join. So I actually got into West Point for undergrad, but I graduated high school in 2003.  That's right when our country went to war and my parents were like, "You are not going into the army.  No."  I just saw it as a second call to service and that's how I ended up in the Army.

And it's been great because they have so many sleep challenges and it's getting better over the years where we're getting away from this culture that sleep is for the week and you'll sleep when you're dead. But I, I love operating in that world.  Because you're challenging people. To think differently and to do better and be better.

Stef

Many of us are familiar with just how important sleep is, and it's definitely backed up by  the sleep foundation.  That sleep affects basically every system in the body. So without it, obviously we can face a lot of consequences like fatigue and moodiness and more severe sleep deficiency.  It can become pretty dangerous for our body and our long-term risk of things like high blood pressure and mood imbalances. So as an expert in this field, when you think about just the science behind the different stages of sleep, can you break it down for us, like a 1 0 1 on what are the different stages of sleep and what type of sleep should we be getting on a regular basis?

Allison

Yeah, so there's three stages of, it's called non REM sleep, non rapid eye movement sleep, and there's one stage of REM sleep or rapid eye movements. Sleep. So non-REM sleep, it goes from a light state to a deep state. The state that really matters is the deep state. So that's where all the endocrine hormone release that is absolutely essential and necessary for recovery like growth hormone and insulin growth factor and testosterone, cuz even women secrete testosterone.

That's where that's happening and there's so many studies. Now though if you don't get good non REM sleep, then you're not gonna recover from the day-to-day  daily demands of training. REM sleep is also really important cuz this is where learning and memory happens. So basically the brain chooses while you're in REM sleep what it wants to remember and what it wants to throw out.  So if you're a young athlete learning a new skill like pole vaulting or say a new complex movement in gymnastics, if you're not getting good quality REM sleep, then you're gonna have a hard time learning that skill and eventually perfecting that skill. And this is true across every element of life.

So sleep serves the same function. Whether you're a growing teen or you're a fully grown adult who's still competing or just  living their daily life through fitness.

Stef

Your area of expertise explores the biological mechanisms of environmental stressors. So for those of us who aren't super immersed  in this. Side of the science of sleep. Can you walk us through what exactly these terms mean and what type of environmental stressors are most relevant for young women athletes?

Allison

I think the same environmental stressors of the Army apply to athletes as sleep deprivation, right? Waking up super early to travel and compete. That's what we do, except it's much more life or death. Circumstance sometimes fueling, making sure you have  the correct fuel.

Hydrating, making sure you're getting enough water and fluids and electrolytes in you before you're competing. And then also competing in the cold the heat, all those environmental factors, there's a reason why we're using athletes as a military relevant population.

Stef

Can you share with us the difference between good sleep and then also good emotional health, and why are these two things so deeply connected?

Allison

Bottom line is sleep deprivation hijacks emotional health. We've done a lot of studies to show that without sleep, you basically perceive things as more threatening in your environment. You're more emotionally volatile, you're more reactive to stress. That is what emotional health is, and there's actual evidence to show, if you look at brain scans of what the brain looks like under stress and sleep deprivation, that the emotional system of the brain is hijacked and can't operate and function like it does under normal, rested, non-stressful conditions.

Stef

Let's talk about the length of time for sleep, because I feel like I've seen my kids go through different patterns of this and as an adult who is now running her own company, I don't get very much sleep and I need to work on that after this episode. But the National Institute of Health notes that teenagers have biological clocks that are changing and meaning there's this natural tendency for teenagers to fall asleep later and then wake up later. So given this biological factor, what advice would you have to young women athletes on how to navigate their sleep patterns?

Allison

A lot of it's school dependent, right? If your school system is adopting it, that's awesome. If your school system is not adopting it, you're gonna have to use something like blue light, because blue light can help advance your clock despite this biological tendency to delay the morning. 

The other thing they could do is make sure they go to bed early, right? Loading up on sleep as much as possible,  because they're gonna be so exhausted from practice and schoolwork and everything anyway  It's not that they won't have issues falling asleep, it's just when it comes to next day performance , their peak is just not gonna be as high as it normally would be if they had the ability to be in a school system with a later school start time.

Stef

Yeah. And as we develop, Allison, we've always heard this magic number of eight, like you need eight hours of sleep, but is that the same for every single person and for when. You think about your life at different ages as a young person, as a developing person whose body is still growing than somebody who's in college. How do you think about the hours? Is there science behind how many hours we need?

Allison 

Yeah, there is.  So it's 8.4 for the average human adult but  there's a bell curve.  Teenagers need at least 10 hours of sleep.  It goes up in teenage years, right? Because you have a growing brain and a growing body and then it starts going back down. And then past the age of 60, you only need six hours of sleep. 

Stef

Interesting. 

Well, Let's talk about napping, because I've always been one that has struggled to nap.  I think I'm wired as  ‘get lots done, be an efficient mom / entrepreneur x athlete,' and I just have a hard time with napping. But I've heard so many interesting things  from the science side of napping, and I'm so jealous of people who can nap like that without even trying.

So tell me about the science. First of all, is napping something that's good for your body and mind? And then how do we work that into our routine as athletes or as entrepreneurs?

Allison

So napping is a wonderful thing. You're right, not everyone can do it.  I also don't have the brain to nap. But whether it's napping or just disconnecting from reality for 10 minutes and just. Doing breath work, right?  Four counts in, four counts out. That is enough to just reset and go on with your day.

But yeah, it only takes 10 to 30 minutes of just that disconnection to help  your brain reset and continue on. And that's what the research shows. It benefits you  emotionally, cognitively and physically.

Stef

Okay, so there's a benefit to doing it. The science says it's good for you, and I really like your suggestion ,if you're maybe in the category like me, where your brain, it's hard to turn off in the middle of the day. I like the breathwork idea. Do you have any other tips for girls that might have the same challenge?

Allison 

Honestly,  if  you can't get in a quiet place to  close your eyes and do some breath work, literally just going outside and taking a walk, like those, meditative things are also just as effective because really what it's doing is it's  changing your brain state and it's having your brain enter a state that's more just relaxing,  the brain activity is reflective of what it's like to be in a relaxing state of mind.

Stef

Love it.

Can you share with us a few strategies that young women athletes in the VIS community can do to promote this emotional sleep connection?

Allison 

This is what I love, being a coach and a mentor through VIS is to give these sleep strategies to help young female athletes.

Biggest thing is an hour before bed, you have to just turn your brain off. You have to prepare mentally for just shutting down your brain for eight or nine hours. So that means no phone, no tv, no stress from homework, just doing something that is relaxing to you,  and sort of just disconnects you from the stress of the day to day of school and practice and family/ friendship issues. 

The second thing is environment really matters. So keeping your room as dark and as cool as possible. Now, sound machines, those are actually a great investment. The brain reacts very differently to that kind of noise. But that would be my second recommendation is keeping the environment as sleep friendly as possible. And  these seem like simple strategies, but they really are so much so that like we've implemented these strategies since as late as 2008 in the Olympic Village. So I worked with the US Olympic Committee back then and then again in 2012 to basically help design and create sleep friendly environments in the Olympic Village because it's basically  a setup of college dorms and it's not  the most optimal place for sleeping.

Stef

Yeah, I think our audience and our community here at VIS can very much relate to that, right? It's sometimes hard to control your environment and when you know that sleep is important for your recovery and for your performance and also your emotional wellbeing, and then you get in bed and you just can't fall asleep.  How do you get yourself over that hump when you're like, "All right, I know I should create this routine. It's also good to go to bed around the same time;  fall asleep and wake up each day." You create these great routines, but sometimes it can just be super hard to turn your mind off. So what's the strategy for that?  

Allison

Yeah. it's hard.  It really is that discipline, like that same discipline you have in sport with doing an intentional warmup, you have to do like an intentional wind down routine. You have to find a way to trick yourself to minimize those distractions and just get after it. And it can be a challenge at first, but whether it's using something like the whoop strap or your phone to remind you like, "Hey, you should start prepping for bed and winding down."  You just have to intentionally figure out ways to do it.

Stef

Let's talk a little bit more about  the environment that we're all in, especially these young women athletes today where their social media is just a huge part of their daily life. And we know there are so many negative effects, especially for young adults with the impact and time spent on social media. And whether that is comparison or leading to depression and anxiety there's just a lot of negative effects of social media, but it is part of our society today. So how does that relate to sleep and what advice would you have for young girls knowing the science behind being on your device and social media when it comes to then setting yourself up for a strong sleep routine?

Allison

Great question.  I think it's less so the blue light now and more so the anxiety, the fear of missing out. There's a study that shows that  having that feeling of FOMO can contribute to poor sleep- just the  underlying sort of subconscious negative affect that can be created on social media sometimes and even positive affect.

Before I was not allowed to be on TikTok because of being in the Army, but when I was on TikTok, I realized it just disrupted my sleep.  Even if I stopped watching  these ridiculous videos an hour before bed, that excitement and positive euphoria it created,  it disrupted my sleep. So I think that's the biggest thing is regulating your social media time. And there are tools out there to help us.

Stef

 Yeah. If you're a parent of an athlete today with  all of this technology and screens and just the accessibility of some of these things that cause anxiety what advice would you give to parents that are navigating their child's wellbeing and also sleep?

Allison

Not to paint a scary picture, but I think sometimes you have to show the direct relationship between sleep and impact on athletic performance, impact on injury impact on endocrine health. That's a strategy I use with these young invincible men who think that they'll sleep when they're dead, 

I show them the direct impact that sleep has on their testosterone, and it's by showing them those direct loss in performance; that's how you change it.

Stef

It's hard though when you're a parent and you're like, "Okay get some sleep."

My kids are pretty young, so it's like how do you frame up the conversation around sleep so that it is more of a tool and a performance piece maybe than it is about "You gotta stop doing things you wanna enjoy and go sleep now"?

Allison

I think that's just what it is. Like, "Hey,  you wanna get to this level, but you have to understand that it's not just how you practice, it's not how much you train, it's the recovery stuff," and  giving them anecdotal evidence from professional athletes.

It works with my guys too. I tell them what LeBron James does and what Roger Federer and all those athletes that have pro sleep.  It works with our community, and I know it worked with female athletes. I know Lindsay Vaughn, she has great sleep habits, Serena Williams-  these female athletes they look up to.  That's the way to go is to show them what the pros are doing and convince them that this is how the pros got to how they are starting out at your age and doing the same things you were. It's just they had good habits along the way. And look at where they are now.

Stef

When you take a look across some of those athletes you just mentioned Serena, Lindsay and you were to frame up  a way to analyze if you have a good sleep routine and a good  sleep system. How would you summarize that for a young girl out there today?  What are those components or that framework that makes a great sleep routine?

Allison

I think the framework is exactly what we were just talking about how you treat sleep like you would your warm up or your cool down or any part of your training where you start winding down at a certain time, you start putting away your phone or putting away distractions that are going to disrupt your sleep.

You dim the lights, you know, at least 20 minutes before bed; you have complete darkness.  You wanna treat it the same way as you would your warmup or cool down routine because at the end of the day,  athletes, that's what we live for is routine. We're so superstitious about our routine too.

Like if we don't warm up the same way every day, there's this trigger that goes off in our head like, "Oh, I might get injured today because I didn't do this warmup exercise," whether there's evidence for it or not. But you have to treat sleep the same as you would everything else  around training and practice.

Stef

Since you're the expert in this space, I'm really curious, like what is your go-to component of your sleep routine that really works for you, that you always do every day?

Allison 

So I travel a lot. I'm gonna be gone soon for a little bit, and an hour before bed, no phone, no work. Truly I read a book or I read a magazine. And then 20 minutes before bed, I take a shower and then,  I make sure my room is dark, cool and quiet. So that's it. Work away an hour before bed, take a shower, and then dark, cool and quiet.

Stef

I love it. It's simple. It's not too  over the top. I'm imagining all these elaborate routines of like a Serena Williams and what that might be, but I think to boil it down to just, " Hey, you're an expert in this field, and those are the three simple things you're doing." And it can go a long way.

What does the science show in terms of, once you start really focusing on sleep and building a routine, when do you start feeling the effects of that in your performance and in your emotional state? 

Allison

Oh, it's immediate.  If you've had sleep issues in the past, it could take a few weeks, but it's an immediate impact.  That's why we say it's sleep and next day performance.

Stef

 But I'm assuming that  if you do it  over and over again, there's some sort of benefit for that, right? I don't want the girls to think, "Oh, you know what? I could just be really terrible for a week and then just do one good sleep routine"? 

Allison

 Oh yeah,  no, you have to do it every night. Again, you think of it like a cool down routine. You think of it like a warmup routine. It has to be intentional.

Stef

So we also know how important the role is of a coach and your teammates to set up a culture where sleep is important and your mental wellbeing and your mental health is important. So can you talk a little bit about  your own experiences, but also  the importance that the coach has in creating this environment where this is a priority.

Allison

Coaches are where it starts, right?   We're leaders, we're mentors.  The kids are gonna follow what we do. So if we  talk about our good sleep habits and demonstrate  overtly that we have good sleep habits or good lifestyle habits, then our kids are gonna wanna do what we are doing because.

One, they know that's how we got to our level If we had that career in our past. And two,  they wanna impress you, right? Like they wanna show you that they're committed  as an athlete.  And so that's really what it begins, is following the leader.

Stef

I would love to hear your opinion on just what are the top three myths that you feel are out there about sleep that you wanna break.

Allison

 First off, you can catch up on sleep. That happens through napping and going to bed early. Two. You will not get dementia if you don't sleep. I think that myth needs to go out the window. Sure. Lack of sleep increases  certain risks, but that doesn't mean it's a,an absolute. And the third thing is only sleep can replace lost sleep, and that means  caffeine or anything that is like a hack. It doesn't work. The brain knows what real sleep looks like.

Stef

 What do you think is different about athletes when it comes to sleep?  Do we need more sleep as athletes and as women athletes?

Allison 

Absolutely. So if you think about sleep is a means to conserve energy and to replenish energy reserves that are exhausted.  So if you're an athlete, you're exhausting those energy reserves more frequently. And so the more you train and the more you compete, the more your body demands sleep.   There's a reason why Olympic athletes, professional athletes sleep as much as 11 to 12 hours in a day. That's what their body demands.

Stef

If you could give one piece of advice to all young women athletes out there in sport today, what would be your one piece of advice?

Allison

I would say live in the moment because it will be over before you know it, and you won't realize  how incredible and how impactful those group of women and teammates are in your life until you don't have that anymore as an adult.  That's the hardest part about adult life is  moving on from that time  of your life of competing training and being around a group of strong, powerful women. It's hard to find that out in the adult world sometimes. 

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Stef

And for all of the young girls that haven't had a chance to come to a session with you on the Voice and Sport platform and learn about sleep.  If you could just tell them one thing that they need to walk away with from any of your sessions on our platform, what would that one thing be?

Allison 

Sleep to perform at the end of the day,  sleep is the  secret weapon. That really is what separates the pros from everyone else. The pros have done it right and they've made sure they've gotten good sleep.

Stef

Amazing.  Thank you so much  for coming on to the Voice and Sport podcast and for being part of our community. You're such an incredible leader, woman, and mentor, and we're excited to see what you do next.

Allison

Oh, well, thank you. I feel so grateful to be a part of the, this community.  You know, I work with soldiers and athletes. But to work with young female athletes is near and dear to my heart. , that was me at one point in time and I had great mentors and  I hope everyone had as great of mentors and coaches decided.

Stef

 This week's episode was co-produced and edited by VIS creator Elizabeth Martin and vis creator Megan Dorr, a sophomore at the University of Missouri. Dr. Allison Brager’s expertise teaches us about the secret weapon of sleep for athletes and the different strategies we can take to achieve this much needed sleep.

She encourages us to find a consistent environment and support system that best promotes our sleep. At the end of the day,  Dr. Allison Brager reminds us that prioritizing sleep will not only help in athletic performances, but positively impact our mental health, which is just as important as athletic performance. We're so grateful to have Dr. Brager as a part of our voice and sport community as a vis expert.

And if you have not checked out her session so far on the Voice and Sport platform, join our community today and check out her amazing Sessions on sleep. Please click the share button in this episode and send it to another athlete that you think might enjoy this conversation. And of course, if you liked our conversation with Allison, please leave us a rating and review on Apple and Spotify.

You can follow Allison on Instagram at d j Ooc K Zzz. If you're logged into voice and sport.com, please head over to the feed and check out our article to Nap or Not to nap, which dives deeper into Dr.

Greger's expertise on sleep science. Also, take a look at our sessions page and search for Allison or request a one-on-one with her and learn more about sleep.

If you're interested in hearing more about our incredible vis experts, check out our podcast episode number 69 with Dr. Emily Kraus, where we address preventing bone injury and red s. Thank you for listening to this week's episode on The Voice and Sport Podcast, and see you next week.

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Host: Stef Strack

Producer: VIS Creator™ Megan Dorr and Elizabeth Martin