This Silver Medalist Olympian Says She Gets the Best Sleep in Her Dorm Room: Here's Why

It might take discipline to train for the Olympics, but coming in a close second is the willpower to stop scrolling hours before bedtime. Yet, that’s the standard that Olympic swimmer Erin Gemmell holds herself to, even at the young age of 19. She recently shared in a Bustle interview that her solid sleep routine starts way before bedtime. (1)

“The last thing I do before bed is a nice little yap session with my roommate. It’s easier to wind down when you’re having a conversation in the dark instead of staring at a phone screen,” she says. She also admits that she has to put her phone down multiple hours before bed. “A lot of the struggle is like, I got to put my phone down. So at 9 or 10 p.m., I know I have to do it or else I’ll feel the consequences.”

The Olympian recently won a silver medal in the 4×200 meter freestyle relay in August. She and her teammates train up to 13 times per week, so sleep isn’t just about health, but performance as well.

So what is she doing instead of scrolling? “Yapping” with her roommate, she jokes. She attends the University of Texas, and is originally from Potomac, Md. On top of 5 a.m. wakeups for training, she is taking an honors pathway in her college and is a business major, according to the school’s athletic site.

Leave it to an Olympian to find dorm rooms relaxing — but that’s exactly what she credits to her tranquil wake ups each day. Not all students transition from home to dorms and sometimes back again as seamlessly.

Gemmell shares her favorite memory with fellow Olympian Katie Ledecky as well, involving some solid girl time — “I was watching her do her own nails, and I said please, let me do it instead. It’s really nice to have some normal, non-athlete kind of sleepover “girl time” activity where we can just chat. I get to do someone’s nails, which I love, and she gets a cute set of nails out of it,” she shared in her interview.

But back to that phone. Gemmell’s dedication to her sleep hygiene and specifically her bedtime routine is backed by research, not just her lifelong dream to make it to the medal podium. She’s defying the odds of what college typically looks like when it comes to sleep. The National Institutes of Health reported 70 percent of college students got less than 8 hours of sleep each night. (2) A 2023 study found that more than 72 percent of female students reported getting less than 7 hours of sleep due to work and school requirements. (3) That just won’t work if you’re really going for gold.

So while the Olympics might have come to a close (depressing), you can take one from Gemmell’s book and sleep quite literally like a champion. Here are a few go-to steps to enhance your sleep via an intentional bedtime routine and better sleep hygiene:

Don’t just consider the hours before bedtime: exercise much earlier in the day, eat a variety of whole and healthy foods, and invest in meaningful activities and relationships, destressing where you can.
Choose and keep a regular bedtime: and as Gemmell does, cut out phone or close screen use for a few hours before that time. If it’s hard to replace, turn on a funny or calm movie, not right by your face.
Avoid too much napping, caffeine, and bedtime exercise: if you wouldn’t find Gemmell working out at 9 p.m. there’s a reason — it can be overstimulating and make it hard to fall asleep.

Take some time to further personalize your own sleep hygiene routine that works best for you to ultimately sleep like a champion.

Sources

1. Orenstein, Hannah; “This Olympic Swimmer Gets Her Best Sleep In Her College Dorm Room,” Bustle; https://www.bustle.com/wellness/erin-gemmell-claire-weinstein-interview-sleep-motivation; August 13, 2024.

2. Hershner SD, Chervin RD. Causes and consequences of sleepiness among college students. Nat Sci Sleep. 2014 Jun 23;6:73-84. doi: 10.2147/NSS.S62907. PMID: 25018659; PMCID: PMC4075951.

3. Guo C, Piao S, Wang C, Yu L, Wang K, Qu Q, Zhang C, Yu X. The prevalence and associated factors of sleep deprivation among healthy college students in China: a cross-sectional survey. PeerJ. 2023 Sep 18;11:e16009. doi: 10.7717/peerj.16009. PMID: 37744238; PMCID: PMC10512935.