Binaural Beat-Down

Greetings children of the blogosphere, this week I will be discussing the topic of binaural beats and their application to enhancing athletic performance.  Last Thursday, I saw a commercial for a local news cover story about iDoping: teenagers getting high off sound.  I thought to myself: "really?  Is iTunes about to become the biggest drug dealer in the world?"  I didn't actually watch the story (a new episode of Jersey Shore was on), but I did some googling later that night.  Turns out, iDoping is just re-labeled binaural beats and has been used as meditation aids for years.  The Washington Post actually looked into this back in August 2010 (see their article here) with the general conclusion that iDoping really won't get you high, but could alter your behavioral state.  Anyway, let's start with the basics and see how binaural beats could possibly impact your next workout or match.

Our journey begins in the realm of neuroscience.  The brain is a tangled mess of cells called neurons.  Electricity is used to trigger chemical reactions and communication amongst neurons.  This communication on a massive scale results in Human "thought."  See the Wikipedia page for a more detailed description.  Voltage measurements of the brain (EEG) form what we call brain waves.  There are several categories of brain waves, which are categorized by their frequency.  For example, theta waves have frequencies in the range of 4-7 Hz and are usually associated with drowsiness (Hz is the abbreviation for Hertz which is the number of times per second a complete wave is measured).  Delta waves have a frequency up to 4 Hz and are associated with slow-wave (deep) sleep.  Eventually, we'll discuss gamma waves and their uses.  Each range of brain wave frequencies is described in more detail here.  As you know, sound is transmitted in waves as well.  Let's put on our headphones and imagine a tone entering your left ear at a particular frequency and a similar tone entering your right ear at a slightly different frequency.  The difference of these frequencies is mapped to the appropriate brain wave, with prolonged exposure helping the brain behave in the states associated with the "synthetic" brain wave.  For example, waves of frequency 350 Hz are sent into the right ear and waves of frequency 347 Hz are sent into the left ear, resulting in synthetic brain waves of 3 Hz, or delta waves.  Delta waves are associated with deep sleep and it is believed that prolonged exposure to "delta wave" binaural beats will enable deep sleep to be entered sooner and longer.  This is something that I have a great interest in -- imagine getting 8 hours of sleep in 4 hours!  Check out the Wikipedia entry for more details.

Theta Brain Wave

I know you're saying this sounds quite academic; now that we have the necessary prerequisites, let's delve into some strictly athletic discussions.  In most sports the player is required to perform extremely complicated tasks in amazingly small intervals of time: with a club speed of 115 MPH, a golfer hits a 275 yard drive with a perfect fade for a dogleg right hole; a soccer player avoids the covering defender, dribbles the ball down field and completes the perfect cross; a baseball batter identifies ball movement and speed via a pitcher's motion and ball spin, and goes on to perfectly strike a spherical surface with a cylindrical one so that the ball travels 430 feet into a section of cheering fans.  All of the preceding actions require intense concentration, something that does not always come naturally.  This is where binaural beats come into play, and more specifically: gamma brain waves.  Gamma brain waves are believed to be associated with movement and intense concentration.  I used to play soccer after work on Fridays, but after a full day of work my head just wasn't in the game.  Could my brain waves have been in the low beta range?  Perhaps a 30 minute binaural gamma wave session would have helped me become more alert and more able to concentrate on the field.  I plan on conducting a pre-game gamma wave experiment on myself at the next opportunity.  It is now typical for athletes to warm up to their favorite tunes, perhaps there is some competitive advantage to be gained by playing tracks of gamma waves.  Unfortunately, I cannot find any evidence of professional athletes currently utilizing binaural beats.

A Tiger Woods drive

We've talked a great deal about binaural beats, but not about where to find them -- don't worry the iDoping hoax hasn't made them illegal yet.  As a matter of fact a great deal of tracks can be found online for free.  Performing a quick YouTube search for "gamma waves binaural beats" lead me to the video below, which I actually listened to while writing the second half of this entry.  Additionally, there are several iPhone and Android apps (BinauralBeat is a free iPhone app with many positive reviews).

If you do experiment with these let me know, as I'd like to incorporate user experiences into a follow-up blog entry.