5 Rules for Cold Plunges as a Garage Gym Athlete

Podcast Transcript

Jerred:  Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Garage Gym Athlete Podcast. Today I'm talking cold exposure. I am hitting on the science, but ultimately just kind of giving Garage gym athletes some takeaways if they wanna do cold plunging. I've gotten some questions about this, so I want to take a look back. We've, we've talked about cold plunging a lot over the years.

We've also talked about. Cold exposure and how it can increase performance. So I'll talk about that a little bit as well. But ultimately, what are some of the rules you should be following if you want to do cold plunging? Because everyone has a cold plunge these days, or they're trying to do it. They're making their own.

Uh, with the, you know, the ice chests that they're buying DIY style, or they're buying them, uh, straight up like a cold plunge for thousands of dollars, um, or $10,000. These things are getting crazy, but everyone's doing it. And the real question is, should you be doing it? And if so, like how would it fit in with your training?

And I had an athlete send me this kind of Click Baity Instagram social media post that said, study reveals cold plunges, reduce muscle growth by up to 66%. And they were asking me if this is true, if it's something they should be concerned about. And it is true to some degree. And so I'm gonna, I'm gonna be breaking these things down in today's short episode.

So here's the deal. We have covered this multiple times, multiple different studies on the Garage and Athlete Podcast. We've talked about cold exposure and how it can increase performance. I'm gonna talk about that, just rehash that a little bit today. And we've talked about how it can hurt performance if we're looking for hypertrophy or muscle growth.

'cause all these things are true now that Click Baity, Instagram post. Of course they didn't link to the study that they had, so I did my own research to try and find it. And it looks like they're referencing a study that was from 2015. There have been a lot of updated studies, uh, you know, in the similar vein to that one.

Like, Hey, what happens to muscle growth? Does it fully blunt muscle growth? And I found some additional studies done in, uh, 20 19, 20 20, so on and so forth. Um, people are starting to research this more and more, probably due to its popularity, um, as. Every Instagram influencer you see on the planet is trying to cold plunge or, you know, trying to flex with them, them getting in in cold water.

So let's talk about some of the principles. If you're thinking about do it, doing it, and ultimately I'll give you my opinion at the end of whether or not I think it's worth it. So the first thing is only do cold, cold plunges on non-resistance training days. Okay. Real simple terms here. We don't need to talk about suppressing satellite cell activity or mTOR signaling.

We don't need to get into any of that. Let's just think big picture, how the body produces more muscle. What you do when you do resistance training, you go in the gym and you rip your muscles apart, okay? You're ripping them apart. There's an inflammatory response and this inflammatory response. Is what signals everything else in your body to heal and grow bigger.

And so yes. Would you want to blunt any of that inflammatory response on a resistance training day? Probably not. And here's an anecdotal just one-off for me. All the guys I know who are really serious about like, let's say bodybuilding training, meaning like their muscles need to be a certain size in symmetry and they want to grow bigger.

It. That's like their main goal. They're not worried about running. They're not worried about lifting a certain amount of weight. They just want to be bigger. Those guys that I know, they vo, they avoid cold plunges. They don't do 'em. And there's a reason for it. There's a reason for it. They don't do cold plunges 'cause they don't want to do anything that can make them step, take a step backwards when it comes to muscle growth.

So o only do cold plunges on non-resistance training days. If you're an athlete listening to this and you do. Just straight hypertrophy, bodybuilding training six days a week, then yeah, maybe cold plunges are not for you. And I'm sorry, that's just how it is, but you don't wanna do anything to blunt that inflammatory response.

Going back to, um, that whole idea, like our inflammatory response, we're finding that it's actually good in a lot of ways, right? Like, uh, one thing that physical therapists used to recommend all the time and really any doctor is like, if I have like an ankle injury. I want to ice it, right, like ice it immediately make it cold.

Like let's get that inflammation down. But that's not necessarily the case anymore though. The, the direction the research has gone is like blood flow, get blood flow to the area in and out of the area as much as you can, because that's what's gonna reduce inflammation in the way that we want it to be reduced.

And not this like, uh, you know, forcing it to be less inflamed through ice or ibuprofen, something like that. So that's, that idea is true in injury. Like let your body go through a little bit of its natural process. That's the direction, like a lot of the profession, physical therapy has gone. But at the same time, that's the direction you probably need to be thinking about when it comes to muscle growth.

It's like, would I wanna do anything to blunt my body's natural process? No, you wouldn't. So you don't wanna be doing cold plunges immediately after your resistance training or really on resistance training days, if at all possible. And another similar thing that we've covered on the Garage Gym Athlete Podcast has to do with endurance training.

And that's if you're taking, um, allergy medications. I forgot the designation or the, is it Z one or Z two or E one? Uh, a doctor would know what I'm talking about. Essentially, there are two types of, um. Uh, allergy medications and these antihistamines actually can reduce the effectiveness of endurance training because it's, it's, it's overly, uh, denouncing what should be happening in the body on the signaling pathways for endurance.

So there are a lot of things when we go against the body's natural tendencies, and we've covered like the actual scientific stu studies on all these. When we go against what the body naturally wants to do. We don't see as many results. Take too many allergy meds. You won't see as much training, uh, you won't see as much progress in your endurance training.

Now, if you're like, I, I know I just probably opened a can of worms for people. We did an entire podcast episode on this. We have the studies listed, everything, uh, and that was a big eye-opener for me. But I'm not rehashing all of that right now. I'm just saying when we go against the body's natural tendencies, it's not good.

So. The body's natural tendency is to inflame when muscles get ripped apart, then heal them through its own process. It, it, it produces all of these signaling cells and, and, um, activities for the body. So ultimately we don't wanna do that. So number one, only do cold plunges on non-resistance training days.

Now that moves me to number two. If you do want to cold plunge, do them on endurance days instead. Now I'm kind of saying the same thing in two ways, but I did it intentionally because there's two things to think about when we're talking about endurance training days and cold plunges. The first thing is, we did a study on this.

We, we covered a study on this, on this podcast, you can actually improve performance by lowering your body temperature ahead of time, pre endurance training. This isn't necessarily true of resistance training, but it is in endurance training. So if you can lower your body's temperature, core temperature, um, through cold exposure, then you go train.

It's better for you. You actually have better performance. Now, I don't know if that would be true long term, but in a single session you have better performance. And my theory behind that has to do with the fact that you've significantly reduced inflammation, but you've also lowered your resting heart rate quite a bit.

It's the same reason when you wake up in the morning, maybe you're a little bit colder, uh, than normal. When you're, when you start at early morning workout, it takes your body a little bit warmer than if you were in the. Afternoon already warmed up, like been moving around all day. It's just a different way, way for your body to get warm.

So when you actually intentionally lower your body temperature, you can have greater short-term performance. And a lot of athletes are picking up on this, and that's another thing that we've covered, is like cooling your hands in, in a workout, like actually putting them in ice water. Um, I, I've seen clips of athletes now like using cold air and blowing it underneath their shirt.

Um, what is that? There's like some famous tennis player who's been doing that. There are all these things that you can do to use cold to increase performance, but it's not necessarily like a cold plunge that's like, has this long term. It's more short term performance increases by lowering your body core, core temperature.

So it takes longer for your heart rate to get up to, uh, speed and so you have more performance in the short term. And also keeping your body cool is always going to be. You know, a huge game changer. That's why your performance is worse if you're to exercise outside in the middle of the summer than if you were to exercise outside in the, like, let's say mild temperatures of spring or fall or something like that.

Heat will slow your body down, like your, your 'cause your body's working so hard to cool itself off. So you can do that on endurance days for short-term, short-term performance gains. Now, at the same token, if you wanna just, Hey, like I want a cold plunge. Do it on endurance days. Do it post endurance training, it's gonna reduce some inflammation, but you won't have to worry as much about the signaling that is, uh, you know, on the muscle hypertrophy, uh, pathway because it doesn't signal the same for endurance training.

So if you wanna do a post endurance training, like a post zone two run, that would be great. Hop in a cold plunge, reduce a little bit of inflammation, get some of the psychological benefits, and go on about your day. I don't think it'll be a major factor for you. So that's another thing. So thing one, only do cold plunges on non-resistance training day.

And then thing two, here's how you can do it on endurance training days. If you're a bodybuilder athlete, again, you probably stay away from it altogether. If you're one of our athletes, just use it in a smart way. Now, if, uh, number three, if you must plunge, like it's just something you wanna do and you're gonna do it on a resistance training day, do it before training, not after.

That's a pretty simple one. It's kind of in, in the same line with the endurance training, but I wouldn't try to significantly lower my body temperature before resistance training. It's just if this is something that you want to do because, and I'm gonna talk about this in a second, but if this is something that you want to do because you get a huge rush from it, it's a mental challenge for you, whatever the case is.

And you wanna do it. You wanna do it every day. Or maybe you just spent $6,000 on a cold plunge and you're like, you know what? I have to use this damn thing I can, I can't listen to your podcast and now not use it, even though I know it might affect my gains. Just do it before resistance training. That's worst case scenario.

I. Best case scenario, split the days. Um, worst case scenario, if you're gonna do it on resistance training days, do it before. It just won't be as bad. 'cause it, you won't have all this inflammation that you're blunting ahead, uh, post-workout that happens post-workout. You can do all of this before and then get a lot of the benefits.

So that's the other way that you can go about this. Alright. Thing number four. I think the biggest benefit to cold plunges are psychological. And I don't mean placebo, I just mean actual psychological. If you've ever done a cold plunge. You feel great afterwards. There is a huge response in your body, like on a lot of different levels when you get into cold water, and I think that there are a lot of psychological benefits.

I think it can improve your mental toughness and it improves your mental toughness because I've done a lot of cold plunging and it doesn't matter how consistent I've ever been with it. When I step in front of that cold plunge, I don't want to get in a hundred percent of the time. I don't wanna do it, but then I force myself to do it.

Doing that over and over again, forcing yourself over and over again to do something you don't want to do, in my opinion, is the definition of building mental toughness. So if you can force yourself to get into that water every single day. Or at whatever cadence you want. There's a huge mental benefit to that, a huge mental benefit to building your mental toughness by doing something you don't wanna do.

And I, other than taxes, I don't know if there's anything else. A human doesn't wanna do more than getting in cold water, so that is a huge psychological benefit. At the same time, that rush that you feel of adrenaline or whatever, I will let you know that will probably go away at some point if you're getting that response right now.

Um, I used to get that. I don't get it anymore and I don't do cold plunging as frequently as I used to. Um, but I don't get that huge rush anymore. I don't, I don't see as many benefits from cold plunging as I used to. Like, I don't, when I get out, I don't feel all that much different than before I got in, and I don't know if that's how your body gets used to it.

So when I'm doing cold plunging now, it's really like the fact that I don't want to get in, I get in. It is the mental toughness side of it, not so much what I feel like after the fact. So that's just something to think about. There are a lot of psychological benefits to this, so if we get outside of like, oh, my mTOR pathway or my endurance training, and you're just like, how can I be more mentally tough?

This is a great exercise to do on a daily basis. A once a week, once a quarter, and whatever you wanna do. It's a huge way to build your mental toughness. Now the fifth thing, if you're looking for something that's gonna be benefit, you all, the research, in my opinion, points more towards heat exposure and that it might be a better long-term play than cold exposure.

And I'm talking about if you're gonna do this consistently. It just seems like there's so much more. To heat exposure because like sauna use has been linked to increased growth hormone, better cardiovascular health enhanced sheet, uh, enhanced heat shock proteins, which aid in cellular repair and, and even improve lifespan.

And sauna is anabolic and ice is mostly symbolic of just. Being tough, right? So I think something you need to think about is like, hey, if I wanna pick up these habits or I wanna buy one or the other, should I buy a sauna or should I buy a cold plunge? I would say Go sauna. I just feel like there's so much more to that and I have been really consistent with as sauna for several years.

I. At some point over the last couple years, I've, I've been really, really, um, consistent on doing it daily. Now I try to hit it two to three times per week just for what, what my schedule will allow. And I feel like it's a way better long-term play to use the sauna for your overall health than it is for cold plunging.

And so my overall opinion on cold plunging is that it's a tool and I think in my opinion, 90% of the benefits. Have to do with just the psychological side of it because the anti-inflammatory response, okay, maybe we get some benefit there. Um, there, there's some, some people say it helps boost your immune system, but at the end of the day, it's a stressor.

It's a huge stressor on your body, especially for women. I. And you know, if, if women are, are constantly adding stress to their bodies over and over again, there's a much worse response overall than it would be for a man. And we're finding out big surprise. Women are not just small men. And so we all need to factor in our individual basis for what we can handle stress wise.

And I was actually turned onto this idea very early on, just from my wife. It's like I picked up all these habits and I wanted her to do some too, but when she would pick them up. They weren't the same, it wasn't as good for her, right? And we could see these things through hormone profiles and blood work, and so we had to adjust and we did.

But ultimately, you need to go on that journey yourself. I can't tell you what you should and shouldn't do as a man or a woman, but from my own research, I. All I know is stressors are stressors, okay? If you want to stress out your body all the time and you don't do anything to recover from that, meaning you don't sleep that much, you're under recovered, you don't eat enough, you're doing the cold plunge.

Uh, you, you know, you're fasting, you're doing all these things, it sounds like you're great. But you're not. You're adding too many stressors to your life. You need to always balance the stressor with recovery. And when all you're adding are stressors, how are you actually recovering? So you need to be thinking about that at all times.

So if you want to add cold plunging, by all means do it. I have a cold plunge. I do it maybe once a week or every other week. Now I do it very infrequently and only for the mental benefits. And I have one of the more expensive cold plunges, right? So I did. I waste my money. I don't think so. I think that it's a huge benefit and can be used, you know, in a overall good program, but it's not something I wanna be doing on a daily basis, especially with how we have our training structured.

So that is my quick take, a garage gym athlete kind of coach's view on cold plunging, and you can take it however you want. But that's it for this one. Now, if you are. One of our athletes. We're in the middle of, we're not in the middle. We just started Project Delta New Cycle. Really happy to have everyone in there.

The new app is awesome. I'm interacting with people commenting. It's been a lot of fun. If you are listening to this podcast, you have no idea what I'm talking about. Go to garage gym athlete.com, sign up for a free trial. You can get our app, we can interact, we can train together, and it will be a lot of fun.

We're in the middle of a. Are not in the middle. I keep saying in the middle. We are in Project Delta Cycle right now, and it has been awesome. It's been a lot of fun to do this training with all the athletes. That's it for this one. Remember, if you don't kill comfort, comfort will kill you.