Your Gym Routine Might Be Destroying Your Sleep

I've been passionate about exercise since I was about 20. Running, walking, weightlifting, swimming. Over the years, these became non-negotiable parts of my routine. Around 30, I started taking it more seriously, tracking sets, reps, and progression like a system I was trying to optimize. Progressive overload became part of my operating system, not just in the gym but in how I approached work, startups, and building things from scratch.

That mindset served me well for a long time. But entering my 40s, something shifted. The workouts that were supposed to make me stronger, more resilient, more capable, sometimes left me sleeping worse. I'd train hard, eat well, do everything right. Then I'd lie awake at 4am, body buzzing, mind racing. It took me longer than I'd like to admit to connect the dots.

When More Isn't Better

For about 3 years, I experienced bouts of terminal insomnia. Waking up at 4am and not falling back asleep. It came in waves, sometimes lasting for weeks. I assumed it was tied to the pressures of building something from nothing. And while stress was part of the equation, another culprit was hiding in plain sight: overtraining.

The pattern was consistent. Heavy workouts spiked my cortisol. That cortisol kept my brain alert hours later, long after the workout was done. A rapid-fire gym session with minimal rest between sets, or a high-rep failure workout where I pushed past my limits, would feel like progress in the moment. Then I'd be wide awake before sunrise, wired and unable to settle.

In 2023, I took a forced break for 2 weeks. First I was traveling, then I got sick with what I think was Covid. During those 2 weeks, I started sleeping 7.5 to 8 hours consistently. Something had clearly shifted. But as soon as I got back to heavy lifting, pushing hard for 4 or 5 consecutive days, the 4am wake-ups returned. I didn't need a cortisol test. The symptoms told me everything.

It's Not Just the Gym

What surprised me most was that lighter forms of exercise could have the same effect. For several years, I've been taking my son to swimming lessons once a week. While he was in the pool, I'd swim a few laps myself. It felt like a peaceful, efficient routine. But on the days I swam for more than 10 or 15 minutes, I'd wake up in the middle of the night, unable to get back to sleep. Same low-grade buzzing. Same pattern as the gym.

A similar thing happened with a bodyweight circuit I did at home. Seven exercises in a row, almost no rest, 20 to 30 minutes total. It didn't feel like much at the time, but nearly every night after doing it, I'd sleep worse. It wasn't the intensity of any single movement. It was the accumulation. The stress load without enough recovery built in.

That was the insight that changed things. The problem wasn't any one workout. It was how I structured activity across the day and the week, without accounting for what my nervous system could actually handle.

The Fix: Recovery Within the Workout

The breakthrough came when I changed my entire lifting protocol. Instead of pushing for long sets with short rest, I flipped it. I kept the intense efforts under 30 seconds and then took 2 full minutes of rest between sets. The results were immediate. Not only did I recover better between workouts, but my sleep quality improved dramatically. I stopped waking up wired at 4am.

Workout timing mattered too. For years, I was hitting the gym at 6am. That meant my body began gearing up at 4:30am, which clashed with my usual bedtime of around 10 or 10:30pm. I was training hard but sleeping less, and I couldn't understand why I woke up feeling unrested. When I shifted my workouts to 9:30am, after breakfast and after doing some focused work, the improvement in my sleep was immediate.

Now I apply the same idea to all kinds of exercise. Whether it's lifting, swimming, or doing circuits at home, I build recovery into the activity itself. A steady routine of 35 to 45 minutes of daily moderate exercise works better for me than going all-in every other day. It's a rhythm my nervous system can handle. Enough movement to feel strong, without tipping into overstimulation.

The Principles

The rules I follow now are simple. Always leave 2 to 3 reps in the tank. Cap most sets at 8 reps to keep time-under-tension shorter, because longer sets seem to release more stress hormones that affect sleep. Rest 2 minutes between sets. Limit each workout to 45 minutes. These aren't arbitrary numbers. They're the boundaries I found through years of tracking what worked and what didn't.

Monitoring heart rate variability has been a game changer. Low HRV is a clear signal to ease up. If I ignore it and push through, my sleep suffers that night and sometimes for several days after. Restlessness, higher morning heart rate, a constant undercurrent of fatigue. These were signs I used to ignore. Now I listen.

If you've had 2 or more short nights during a heavy training week, that's your cue. Either dial back the intensity or shift your focus to recovery. Go to bed earlier, add a daytime nap, or tweak your nutrition by adding some extra carbs in the evening. These small adjustments prevent deeper burnout before it starts.

Fitness and Sleep Are the Same System

I've stopped thinking about fitness and sleep as separate goals. They're part of the same system. If you're lifting well, eating well, and keeping your nervous system regulated, you sleep well. If you ignore one of those pieces, everything else starts to wobble.

As a founder, I want a body that can go the distance. So I train with sleep in mind. If you're someone who exercises regularly and still struggles with sleep, look at how you're training before you look at supplements or sleep apps. A small shift in your exercise structure could be the fix your sleep has been waiting for.