For any athlete, stretching and sleep are vital to optimal performance the next day. SELF talks to Team USA about their routines the night before a competition at the Paris 2024 Olympics and Paralympics.
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00 (upbeat music)
00:03 I'll do some stretching,
00:04 maybe I'll take a hot bath if necessary.
00:06 I'll use the jet boots,
00:07 I'll use the Theragun for a little bit.
00:09 But the number one thing for me
00:10 is making sure that I get sleep.
00:12 I can do all this recovery stuff,
00:13 but if I don't get 10 to 12 hours of sleep,
00:15 then I'm not optimizing my recovery completely.
00:18 And so I make sure that 48 hours before I compete,
00:21 I get 12 hours of sleep,
00:23 but I'm making sure that I am optimizing sleep 110%.
00:28 My day before game routine is a little complicated.
00:31 Obviously I eat dinner,
00:33 then I'll do my TheraBoots for like an hour.
00:37 I'll drink a cherry juice,
00:39 I'll drink like an extra glass of water,
00:41 sometimes have like a yoga
00:43 or like 444 breathing meditation thing.
00:47 I take my time, I set out my uniform,
00:50 I get my hydration, my pre foods that I'm gonna be eating,
00:55 and the mixes that I'm gonna be eating
00:57 for my warmup and pre warmup.
00:59 I get my makeup that I'm going,
01:00 that I know I'm gonna be wearing that next morning,
01:03 because that's a huge part of my process
01:06 to get ready the morning of the race.
01:08 So I just get preparing,
01:09 so that way I can just go to sleep,
01:11 that's ready, and focus on the visualization
01:14 of that perfect race course and me executing it.
01:17 - Any of my teammates will tell me like,
01:19 I'm one of the guys that is very loose.
01:21 I don't overly think about the game,
01:23 I don't overly think about like strategy or something.
01:25 At this point, we've put the work in,
01:27 we've done what we needed to do
01:28 to put ourselves in a position to be successful.
01:30 So the night before the game, to be honest,
01:31 like me and my teammates just like to chill,
01:33 just like to not think about the competition.
01:35 Either we're playing some video games
01:37 or we're playing cards or whatever we're doing.
01:39 That's just our time to be together.
01:41 We know that life is gonna be very highly pressured
01:45 in the next couple of hours,
01:47 but the time before the game is just about us being together
01:50 and us enjoying the time that we have together.
01:53 - So the night before is pretty chill.
01:55 The nerves might be kicking, might not,
01:57 depends on the meat, but dinner,
02:00 a little bit of Netflix and chill,
02:01 and you know, get ready for the next morning.
02:04 When I feel the nerves, I will probably be running around
02:08 and talking everyone's head off
02:10 because that's the only way to calm down my nerves.
02:13 - It's weird 'cause I'm not really ritualistic.
02:15 I just go with what I'm feeling like.
02:18 Sometimes I can binge and watch like eight episodes
02:20 of "The Office."
02:21 Sometimes I will play "The Sims" because I love "The Sims."
02:25 (laughs)
02:26 Sometimes I will just like talk to my niece
02:28 for a really long time.
02:30 Sometimes I talk to my mom.
02:31 It literally just depends on like my mood.
02:34 If I'm feeling like I wanna talk to somebody,
02:35 then I'll like reach out and talk to like people
02:37 that are close to me.
02:38 If not, I'm probably binge watching something
02:40 or watching a series or playing "The Sims"
02:42 or "Roblox" with my niece.
02:44 - I'm not great at sleeping at competitions.
02:46 I get really stressed out.
02:47 So I try to have like a nighttime routine of tea,
02:51 of talking with my best friend who's usually my roommate.
02:54 Just a good wind down reading before bed.
02:57 - So I have a specific roommate that I'm always with.
03:00 I do like an hour stretching routine thing
03:03 where first it's like you just stretch
03:06 and then I like roll out on a lacrosse ball,
03:09 the whole body,
03:09 and then I lay on like this back machine kind of thing
03:13 and then like massage gun my legs.
03:15 But then after all of that,
03:17 my teammate and I,
03:19 we like to like face each other and Landrell, the routine.
03:24 Landrell is like doing it with your hands
03:26 and we play the music
03:27 and sometimes we'll be able to look at each other
03:29 and sometimes we'll just like turn off the lights
03:31 and do it 'cause we'll like start laughing so hard.
03:34 - The biggest thing is getting a steak.
03:35 The nights before being a swimmer,
03:38 we got this crazy thing we do.
03:39 We shave our whole body.
03:40 It's less about the hair, more about the dead skin,
03:42 more about the increased proprioception of the water.
03:45 And then sleep.
03:46 Sleep is super important.
03:47 So ideally, you know, getting eight hours of sleep.
03:50 - Watching some anime.
03:52 If I have time after that is stretch a little bit,
03:55 ice off my injury and probably that's it.
03:59 - I like to do an everything shower, get a clean shave.
04:03 So my legs feel nice and smooth in my sheets
04:06 and in the pool the next day.
04:07 I also like to have some good snacks.
04:10 I'll have a little chocolate before bed.
04:11 Never giving up chocolate.
04:13 - Getting all my stuff ready the night before,
04:14 my competition equipment, clothing.
04:17 Most things are already at the competition venue
04:20 before the first day,
04:21 but I just get all my clothes ready to go in my backpack,
04:23 my prosthetics ready, and then I just go to sleep,
04:26 have a good night's sleep and get up in the morning.
04:28 - First off in rugby,
04:29 we have something called the jersey ceremony
04:30 where we come together.
04:31 A lot of times our family's invited and we get our jersey
04:32 and that's a big moment for us
04:34 because we like to say we're passing through our jersey.
04:35 So every time it's special to be able to wear
04:37 that USA jersey.
04:38 And then a lot of times if my family's there,
04:40 I'd love to go out to dinner with them and just enjoy them
04:42 'cause they're there to watch me.
04:43 And if not, I hang with my team
04:45 or I'll sometimes go out to dinner on my own,
04:47 but I don't have any strict schedule, I guess.
04:49 - 24 hours before I compete is really just trying
04:52 to almost meditate myself a little bit
04:55 in a way to calm anxiety, calm nerves,
04:57 just make sure my body and my mind
04:59 are all kind of in the same place and ready to compete.
05:02 Sort of taking time alone, honestly,
05:04 that's what I've always done.
05:05 I don't want to talk to you.
05:07 I don't want to talk to anyone before my races,
05:09 whether that's the night before or day up.
05:10 - I do have like a unintentional self-care routine
05:13 where I'm just like pretty chill the night before.
05:15 I try to get all the field hockey out of the way
05:17 as much as possible the day before.
05:19 I think we're starting to get better
05:20 at doing that as a team.
05:21 And then once we finish our last meeting,
05:23 it's just kind of downtime so that I don't get too stressed
05:26 and I can sleep well.
05:27 - I do try to do a little bit of mindfulness.
05:29 It's not always the night before,
05:30 sometimes it's before the game,
05:31 but if I'm feeling especially stressed,
05:33 I find it like a good way to just like settle down
05:35 and be calm.
05:36 - I'll pack my bag and get everything ready for the morning
05:39 because I'm not a morning person
05:40 and I forget things very easily.
05:42 So I'll go through my checklist,
05:43 make sure I have all my competition gear ready.
05:45 I'll just like throw on a movie, like a comfort movie,
05:48 like "Finding Nemo," a Disney movie, something like that.
05:50 Just try to take my mind off of competition
05:54 so that I can relax, hang out with my friends,
05:56 talk to my mom.
05:57 - I will usually have dinner.
05:59 That usually means I've just made weights.
06:00 I'm going to go hydrate as much as possible.
06:02 I will try to get to bed around like nine or 10 PM
06:06 because I need to get my rest in before I go fight.
06:08 - Eat around 7.30, take a shower,
06:11 get into the bedtime clothes,
06:13 make some sleepy tea and, you know,
06:15 kind of just sit on the couch, watch some TV, Netflix,
06:18 and then my compression boots.
06:20 That's a big one just for regen
06:22 and to get ready for the game the next day.
06:24 - Wearing out my robe, my suit, my towel, my caps,
06:27 my sandals, prioritizing getting a good night of sleep,
06:30 whatever that means,
06:31 like winding down doing something fun for me
06:34 and then getting in bed, reading a good book
06:37 and going to sleep.
06:38 - It's similar, just trying to relax
06:40 because there's a lot of adrenaline, a lot of thoughts.
06:43 So getting those out of the way in a sense,
06:45 having our team meeting, visualizing for the game,
06:48 and then taking a moment, lighting a candle,
06:51 which we bring on our trips.
06:53 And I'm actually pretty inconsistent
06:56 with my skincare at home,
06:57 but when I'm on the road, I'm really on it.
07:01 I think it's just having that routine
07:02 and, you know, being able to relax
07:05 and put on my little mask and go through that
07:08 helps me have a better night's sleep
07:10 and get into my book and kind of enjoy
07:13 that little down moment before the big day.
07:16 - I make sure to have all of my gear in one place,
07:21 have it all packed up,
07:21 try to wind down by dimming the lights
07:25 or putting them in more of a yellow warm lighting
07:28 so that it's not so harsh on my eyes
07:30 so that I can feel a little bit more tired.
07:33 I typically have some sort of tea or hot water
07:37 and to have some sort of nighttime routine
07:39 to let my body know it's time to settle down and go to bed,
07:43 put on nice pajamas,
07:45 make sure the room temperature is good to go,
07:47 and then crawl into bed.
07:49 - Doing some light stretching.
07:51 Sometimes I like to get a workout in,
07:54 especially if the game is in the morning.
07:56 Usually I like to work out the same day of the game,
07:59 but usually morning if the game's late in the evening.
08:01 - I like to make sure everything is set out.
08:04 My bags are packed, my uniform is laid out.
08:07 I have everything that I need.
08:09 That way I can actually sleep
08:11 without thinking of my packing list.
08:12 And then it's important that I try to read
08:15 or just kind of calm my mind before going to bed.
08:18 - The night before is always pretty mellow.
08:19 I mean, it's always, I try to get to bed pretty early.
08:21 I'm not a very good sleeper.
08:23 So I try to get in bed by like 8.39, which is very early,
08:26 but give myself some time to fall asleep.
08:28 And yeah, just try to battle that anticipation.
08:31 (upbeat music)
08:33 [Music]