The victory of Korea’s national soccer team depends on biological clock

The victory of Korea’s national soccer team depends on biological clock. January. 30, 2015 07:12. .

What would be the possibility that Korean men’s national soccer team wins in the finals at Australia’s Asian Cup 2015 on Saturday? Researchers in the U.K. advise that proper control of players’ biological clock could maximize athletes’ performance.

A research team headed by Dr. Roland Brandstaetter at School of Biosciences of University of Birmingham released its study results on “Current Biology” dated on Friday. According to the study, players’ performance level can vary up to 26 percent depending on the time slot they do sports. Dr. Brandstaetter said that just 1 percent of difference in athletes’ performance can make a big difference, adding that track and field player at the 2nd and 4th places in men’s 100 meters in the 2008 Beijing Olympics could have had reversed records. Back then, the former covered 100 meters in 9.89 while the latter in 9.93.

The research team classified 121 athletes at the average age of 22.5 into three different types of morning-type, night-type and mid-type players, and conducted a physical endurance test. Based on the test results, the team analyzed the time slot when the players have the maximum performance of motor ability.

The results showed that the morning-type players had the best performance at 12:20 p.m., on average 5 hours and 36 minutes after they woke up. On the other hand, the night-type athletes produced the best achievement at 7:40 p.m. and mid-type people at 3:50 p.m., 11 hours 11 minutes and 6 hours 30 minutes after they get up, respectively. This contradicts a common belief that sports players exert their best performance around night time.

The team said that a steroid hormone cortisol is the main culprit. Dr. Brandstaetter said that night-type players have delayed secretion of cortisol as the secretion of sleep-inducing hormone melatonin is postponed, adding that since cortisol plays an important role in muscle flexing, they produce the best result during the night time.

“Motor ability goes down immediately after people wake up. For this reason, the Korea Institute of Sports Science recommends the Korea National Training Center to reduce the intensity of training in early morning, which is usually done before breakfast,” said Professor Park Dong-ho at School of Arts and Sports of Inha University. "When players go overseas where there is time difference, they take in melatonin and go to bed early as a strategy.”