Cryotherapy For Recovery and Pain Relief
I first drafted this blog post as I entered the final week of preparation for the Canadian Strongman national championships a few weeks ago. The context as I had written it was perfect so I didn’t want to change anything up in that regard even though the competition has been over for about a week and a half.
There are countless factors in the world today that contribute to what amounts to a chronic state of inflammation for most of the population. Giving your body the chance to literally chill out is paramount to wellness and keeping inflammation under control.
While I don’t often galavant around with my training for strongman, I’ve come to realize that it’s of interest to our Flow Spa audience, a group that includes many athletes both past and present who are seeking to recover and remain pain-free.
Research has supported a lot of benefits to cold exposure - often known now as cryotherapy - and at its core, it comes down to three main benefits:
Eliminating inflammation.
Reducing pain and boosting feel-good hormones norepinephrine and dopamine.
Increasing blood flow and circulation.
I recently talked about a couple of the keys ways that I use floating for recovery from heavy training, as it positively impacts the physical beat down of heavy weightlifting along with the nervous system overload.
Something that is not just present and pervasive in heavy training athletes but most of our society is a problem with inflammation. Our gruelling exercise regimes contribute to this issue but so does our less than ideal diet, sleep patterns, long work hours, and constant exposure to the blue light of buzzing devices.
My absolute favourite method of immediate sports recovery is contrast therapy which utilizes hot and cold tubs or sauna combined with cold exposure to induce a powerful anti-inflammatory effect.
This method of recovery does take more gumption than going in for a relaxing float and so it’s not suited for everyone but the research on the anti-inflammatory effects of cold exposure certainly makes this therapy compelling. Runners who immersed their legs in cold water immediately after hypertrophy-stimulating workouts inhibited that muscle growth compared to runners who did not use cryotherapy. This research has led experts to agree that the best time to include contrast therapy or cryotherapy is not immediately post-training like the football teams of old.
Instead, it’s best to do it on days off or as far away from training as possible.
So if you were to train in the morning, it would be best to do your contrast therapy recovery at night. This consideration is most important when you are trying to stimulate muscle growth or strength gains with your training. If you are just working out for health, it won’t be as big of a deal for you. Another caveat is that I consider it a positive to include contrast therapy to reduce the turnaround time between events placed closely together, like when an athlete has a weekend full of tournament games to play and needs to be fresh for the finals.
When it comes to general pain and inflammation these powerful effects still apply, acting like a natural dose of ibuprofen to kick out inflammation and reduce pain. The circulation effects are also very beneficial for those who gradually increase their tolerance and exposure to contrast therapy so as to not shock the system too severely. While soaking in the warm water of the hot tub, blood vessels dilate and then when moving to the cold tub the autonomic response of the nervous system is to constrict the blood vessels to keep the core temperature up.
Moving back and forth from hot to cold therefore acts like and additional pumping mechanism to move the blood through the circulatory system. Increased circulation through any mechanism has been associated with reductions in cardiovascular disease and the incidence of a heart attack.
The other benefit of cold exposure in keeping the body and core temperature warm is that it activates a special type of fat in our body called brown adipose tissue (BAT) which is metabolically active, unlike typical fat stores, and increases in BAT activation is associated with weight loss. Another cool effect (pun intended) of cold exposure is that has been confirmed in the last couple of decades is that we can overtime increase our stores of BAT which was previously thought to be impossible and this can lead to consistent increases in our metabolism over time.
Finally, both the shock of heat and cold lead to euphoric sensations and increase our mood. You may have heard the old story of how Van Gogh was subjected to daily ice baths as a way to control his mercurial mood. Our bodies are incredibly adept at staying in a happy norm but when we push ourselves out of our comfort zone, there are interesting reward mechanisms in place in our bodies. Both heat exposure and cold exposure that leads to an initially uncomfortable feeling in our body lead to the release of a hormone called dynorphin. It’s a kind of protective mechanism in our body that tells us we’re in a situation that we need to be vigilant of and get away from. But when we maintain conscious control to keep ourselves in an uncomfortable situation and literally push past that metaphorical comfort zone, there’s a subsequent rise in endorphins to balance out that dynorphin release, along with a boost in dopamine and norepinephrine which lead to euphoria and a clear focus.
If you ever do take the plunge and try an ice bath, getting out of it you feel incredibly refreshed and focused. I liken it to a cup of coffee without any hint of anxiety or jitters to go along with it.
Any hot or cold exposure can also help us sleep better as one of the primary sleep-inducing signals to the body is a drop in body temperature which can come from either getting really warm and letting your body cool back off before bed or literally plunging yourself down in temperature with cold exposure prior to sleeping. Either way leads to deeper and more restorative sleep.