An archer's habitual sleep quality shows in their score

3 studies · 51 archers measured

Each circle is a study: its position gives the year, its row whether it is for, against or context, its size how many participants it measured. Light circles are studies on other populations or without archers.

Only one study puts the question to the test, and it goes against it. In 2026 twenty-six female recurve archers aged 18 to 25 described their sleep over the previous month on the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index and then shot four sessions at 18 metres within a week: there is no link between the questionnaire score and accuracy, neither raw (r = 0.168, p = 0.413) nor after allowing for age and experience (p = 0.447), and the sign, within the margin of error, even runs opposite to expectation. The result carries little weight because of how the study is built. With twenty-six people only strong links can be seen, the confidence interval of the correlation runs from -0.22 to 0.51, questionnaire scores lie between 2 and 9 out of 21, so none of the archers slept very badly, and sleep on the nights before the sessions was not recorded. Before this study the question had only been touched on: in 2019 a sleep education programme for young Indian archers was followed by a higher score, with no control group, and in 2024, in fifteen kyudo archers, the nights before the best days were not the best nights. What little there is today does not find habitual sleep in the score, but it is not enough to say that sleep does not matter.

Also phrased as: "sleep and archery score"; "poor sleep and accuracy"; "sleep quality and archery performance"; "sleep questionnaire scores and archery"

In practice

It is said that sleep is the first training session, and that an archer who sleeps badly does not shoot well.

Evidence

2019
Context Archers Published later

15 Indian boys aged 14 to 18, a year of sleep education: weekday time to fall asleep drops from 28 to 15 minutes, hours of sleep do not change significantly, and in the 10 who shot on both occasions the training score rises from 1268 to 1291 out of 1440 (p = 0.018), with no control group over the same period. An intervention, not a comparison between archers who sleep well and badly.

Sleep Pattern and Sports Performance of Adolescent Archers: A Pre–Post-intervention Pilot Study · Chandra Sekara Guru, Karuna Datta, Anup Krishnan, Anuj Kumar, Uma Mahajan, Sunil Jhajharia, Manoj Kumar, Amit Kumar, Narendra Yadav, Amar Singh
2024
Context Kyudo archers Published later

15 university kyudo archers, sleep measured with a sensor under the mattress: the days with more hits (83.7 against 61.7 per cent) follow shorter nights, 286.7 against 349.7 minutes, and less efficient ones, 88.7 against 94.1 per cent, while the sleep questionnaire completed on waking does not tell the days apart. It compares nights within the same archer, not habitual sleep between different archers.

Relationship between mood and sleep status with performance accuracy in university kyudo athletes · Masaki Yoshioka, Misato Takada, Makinori Matsuo, Seiji Maeda, Keisei Kosaki
2026
Against Archers Published later

26 female recurve archers from university teams and clubs, 21.2 years old on average: PSQI for the previous month 6.15 ± 1.95 (range 2 to 9; 10 at 5 or below, 16 above) and accuracy over 150-243 arrows at 18 metres in four sessions, 77.7 ± 13.3 per cent. No link: Pearson r = 0.168 (95% CI -0.22 to 0.51, p = 0.413), Spearman 0.043 (p = 0.835); with age and experience B = 1.11 percentage points per questionnaire point, p = 0.447, R² = 0.032.

The Relationship Between Sleep Quality and Shooting Accuracy in Female Archers: A Cross-Sectional Study · Aisuluu Daiyrova, Bilal Demirhan, Dzhiparkul Abdyrakhmanova, Ayça Genç, Zulfiyya Yolchiyeva Asim, Alpamys Rakhymzhanov, Aygül Çağlayan Tunç
2026
Context Archers Published later

The same study measures its own limits: with 26 people it detects, with 80 per cent power, only correlations above about 0.53; the questionnaire range is narrow, 2 to 9 out of 21; sleep on the nights before the sessions was not recorded, and in 5 questionnaires out of 26 hours of sleep exceed hours in bed. Leaving out the archer with the lowest accuracy, the result stays null (r = 0.188, p = 0.369).

The Relationship Between Sleep Quality and Shooting Accuracy in Female Archers: A Cross-Sectional Study · Aisuluu Daiyrova, Bilal Demirhan, Dzhiparkul Abdyrakhmanova, Ayça Genç, Zulfiyya Yolchiyeva Asim, Alpamys Rakhymzhanov, Aygül Çağlayan Tunç

Status history

2019 Not studied The first study to bring sleep and score together in archers is an intervention, not a comparison between those who sleep well and those who sleep badly. Fifteen boys at an Indian army sports institute go through a year of sleep education: they fall asleep sooner, but their hours of sleep and daytime sleepiness do not change, and in the ten who shoot twice the training score rises from 1268 to 1291 out of 1440, with no control group over the same period. Nobody has yet looked at whether, from one archer to the next, everyday sleep goes hand in hand with the score: not studied.
2024 Not studied An objective measure of sleep arrives, but for single nights. Fifteen university kyudo archers, with a sensor under the mattress for a week, have their days with more hits after shorter and less efficient nights, 287 minutes against 350. The comparison is between days for the same archers, not between archers who usually sleep well or badly, and self-reported sleep quality tells nothing apart: the question about habitual sleep remains unanswered.
2026 Contradicted The first study designed for this question goes against it. Twenty-six female recurve archers describe their sleep over the previous month on the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (mean 6.15, range 2 to 9 out of 21) and shoot four sessions at 18 metres the following week: accuracy, 77.7 per cent on average, does not follow the questionnaire, with r = 0.168 (p = 0.413), and nothing changes after allowing for age and experience. One cross-sectional study, with power to see only strong links and a narrow band of sleep in which nobody slept very badly: contradicted.

Research lines

Cite

APA

Campagna, M. (2026). An archer's habitual sleep quality shows in their score (Version 1). In Evidence Registry. Retrieved 8 November 2026, from https://matteocampagna.com/en/registry/health/habitual-sleep-quality-archery-score

BibTeX

@misc{campagna2026_sonnoabitualepunteggio,
  author = {Campagna, Matteo},
  title = {An archer's habitual sleep quality shows in their score},
  year = {2026},
  howpublished = {Evidence Registry, matteocampagna.com},
  url = {https://matteocampagna.com/en/registry/health/habitual-sleep-quality-archery-score},
  note = {Version 1; accessed 2026-11-08}
}

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